More tweens have purchased items from games than from brands’ websites

No fewer than 7 in 10 tweens (70%) have purchased products from inside video games or virtual worlds, more than the 58% who’ve purchased from brands’ e-commerce sites. So says a new report on 8- to 12-year-olds from YPulse, a market research firm focused on young consumers.

If you’re a brand without a presence in games or virtual worlds like Roblox, the message of the report is not that you might need a wake-up call so much as a defibrillator.

“The in-app economy is training an entire generation in what spending feels like, what brands feel like, and what a transaction is,” the report stated. “And most of that education is happening without most brands in the room.”

• A March report from PwC on the purchase behavior of the slightly wider age swath of all Gen Alpha (7- to 14-year-olds) described them as “the youngest chief influence officers” and as having been “born with the buy button at their fingertips.”

The tween report also notes that the way they persuade their parents today is decidedly more nuanced than those of us who grew up whining incessantly in the cereal aisle because our parents wouldn’t buy Lucky Charms.

Nearly 4 in 10 (39%) of these grade-schoolers have sent their parents a product link from a social media platform, and 78% of their parents credit them for introducing them to new brands.

The report draws on five separate surveys of 1,500 tweens in the US and Canada conducted in 2025 and 2026.

Like other youngsters, tweens are in the thrall of YouTube, with 74% watching YouTube videos on a daily basis, compared to 54% who watch streaming services daily. But what separates tweens is how they watch YouTube, with 83% of them watching on a TV screen, compared to 75% of those aged 13-17 and 71% of those aged 18-24 who do so.

That means that “content that works for tweens is content that survives the couch test with a Millennial parent in the room,” according to the report.

In other words, what might just look like parents’ befuddlement as their kids watch Skibidi Toilet on YouTube on the living room big-screen could, for brands, be the moment they win a new customer.

“The shared screen is where both are watching the same thing, and that is the conversion moment,” the report states. “Brands thinking about tween content as something parents merely tolerate are leaving real reach on the table.”