Depop Safety Guide for Parents
A guide for parents on Depop — a second-hand fashion resale app popular with teenagers — including scam risks, address sharing, and image-based concerns.
Depop is a second-hand fashion marketplace app popular with teens and young adults for buying and selling vintage and streetwear clothing.
Official age
13+
We recommend
16+
Developer
Depop Ltd
Risks
4
Features to know about
Overview
Depop is a peer-to-peer fashion resale app that combines elements of a marketplace with a social feed. It is particularly popular with teenagers and young adults interested in vintage, second-hand, and sustainable fashion. Unlike Vinted, Depop has a social element — users can follow sellers, comment on listings, and build a following. Listings often feature the seller modelling the clothes, which creates specific risks around image-based content.
How children use it
Teenagers use Depop to buy affordable second-hand clothes and to sell their own items. Many aspiring teenage entrepreneurs build small Depop businesses selling thrifted or customised clothing. Because sellers typically photograph themselves wearing items, there is a significant image-sharing dimension to Depop that distinguishes it from other resale platforms.
Main risks
Recommended privacy settings
Profile Photos
Location: Listing photos and profile photo
Set to: Avoid identifiable details in listing photos — no school uniform, visible address, or identifiable location
Many teenagers photograph themselves wearing items for sale. Ensuring listing photos do not include school uniform, identifiable locations, or other personal information is important.
Shipping Only
Location: Listing settings
Set to: Use Depop shipping — do not arrange collection or share address
Depop provides a shipping label system. Never share a home address directly with a buyer — use the platform's shipping system only.
Parent actions
Review your child's Depop profile and listings — check that listing photos do not reveal identifiable personal information
Time: 15 minutes
Talk to your child about common Depop scams — particularly buyers requesting direct bank transfers or PayPal Friends & Family instead of Depop Payments
Time: 15 minutes
Ensure your child uses only Depop's in-app payment system and shipping labels, and never shares their home address with buyers
Time: 10 minutes
Related app guides
If you need to report this
In immediate danger: call 999. For non-emergency police matters, call 101.
Concerned about a child but it's not an emergency? NSPCC helpline 0808 800 5000. Childline for young people 0800 1111.
Myths & facts
Myth: Depop is just an online shop, so it doesn't carry the usual 'social media' risks.
Fact: Depop combines a marketplace with a social feed — following, liking, and commenting on other users' listings — so the same care you'd apply to any app with public photos and public comments belongs here too, not just marketplace scam awareness.
Myth: As long as listing photos don't clearly show my child's face, there's no image-related risk.
Fact: The concern isn't only whether a face is visible — it's what a photo's background or setting reveals, such as a school uniform, a house number, or a recognisable local landmark. It's worth looking at listing photos together with that in mind, whatever the framing of the shot.
Myth: Depop is run by an established company, so its age checks must be properly verified, like a bank's.
Fact: Being part of a larger company brings some standard platform protections, but the age entered at Depop signup is self-declared rather than verified. Parental awareness of the account — not the platform's age gate — is the main safeguard for a younger teenager.
Age by age
- 8-10
The honest answer at this age is 'not yet' — Depop's own minimum age is 13, and the combination of public listing photos, followers and comments, and money changing hands isn't appropriate this young. If there's enthusiasm for secondhand fashion or decluttering, a supervised charity-shop trip or family declutter is a good outlet instead.
- 11-13
This is around or just below Depop's own minimum age, and the platform requires parental consent for 13-17 year olds. If your 13-year-old wants to start, treat it as a supervised first step: set the account up together, agree what will and won't appear in listing photos, and look over the profile and first few listings before they go live.
- 14-16
Many teenagers use Depop reasonably well at this age. Agree the ground rules — Depop's own payment system and shipping labels only, no address sharing, and listing photos checked for identifying background detail — and revisit them as your child gains experience selling and messaging buyers.
- 17-plus
Largely independent use is reasonable at this age. A periodic, light-touch check-in about scam trends or any uncomfortable DMs is still worthwhile, particularly if your teenager is running an active small Depop shop.
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