Day: July 27, 2025

• Etsy witches are selling spells for love, good fortune, and career success, priced from $4 to $400.
• I paid a witch $18.65 for “extreme luck.” It was surprisingly easy, but I had to wade through a lot of AI slop.
• People may turn to the mystical more in times of heightened economic uncertainty.

I opted against the demonic misfortune curse.

Sure, my seatmate on a recent flight made the regrettable decision to eat a whole fried chicken, but she doesn’t deserve supernatural torment. It also wasn’t worth the $40 price tag.

I’m admittedly new to commissioning magic off of Etsy, a website I typically browse to pine after expensive home decor. I’m not big on ghosts, paranormal activity, or superstition.

I am, however, curious.

The Etsy witches are busy these days. Social media is peppered with people offering spells, testifying about their successful spiritual cleansings, and parodying mystic rituals. The US psychic services industry was worth over $2 billion last year, and that’s projected to grow to $4.5 billion by 2033, largely due to online interest. If that projection is right, it’s more than Americans spend on dog walking services today, but less than they spend on nail salons. While the recent success of digital hexes could be a sign that people are bored and leaning into internet trends, it also hints at something more serious.

“Magic is among the things that people turn to when things are becoming uncontrollable, when things are becoming uncertain, when you know the normal methods you use to shore up your life and provide some certainty don’t seem to be working anymore,” Michael Bailey, a history professor at Iowa State University who specializes in medieval Europe and witchcraft, told me.

I can empathize with that. I, too, have a lot of worries about my future and the world. So I spent $18.65 (plus tax) on a spell to bring me extreme luck. I’m not feeling especially unlucky right now — I have many people that I love, and my boss lets me write things like this during work hours. But it seemed like a reasonable price for some extra good fortune, and I would really like a New York City apartment with laundry in the building.

Etsy witches work their magic on your career or love life for prices ranging from $4 to $400

Jamie Mejia, 31, lives in Miami and swears by her Etsy witch results.

About a month ago, she enlisted one for a reading about her love life, which cost her about $5 for each question she asked. Mejia had sensed that her partner wasn’t ready to commit to a serious relationship, a feeling the witch validated. She said it brought her the closure she needed to end things. When she returned for a second reading, Mejia received good news: 2026 will be a big year for her career and personal life.

For prices that range from $4 to $400, the Etsy witches offer anything I might need. I could increase my chances for long-lasting beauty, a dream job, money, protection, warm weather, a perfect wedding, or a loyal sugar daddy. I could inspire an ex to call me or motivate a crush to ask me on a date. Curses were also on the table, including promises of “revenge, pain, and suffering” for my enemies, along with the aforementioned demonic misfortune.

Most of the spells, including mine, had extra-long wait times due to a “high volume of requests.” I chose to ignore the flood of AI-generated images of the alleged witches: several silvery-haired wrinkled women that didn’t look quite human, videos of a sage cleansing ritual where the hand had extra fingers, and perfectly-arranged altars that were too good to be true. It seemed weird that many of the spells were on sale — is it possible to find your soulmate at a discount? For the purposes of this story, it was important that I trust the process.

It’s worth noting that magic has been banned on Etsy since the mid-2010s. Most of the sellers have disclaimers that their work is for entertainment purposes only. A representative for Etsy didn’t respond to my request for comment. Based on the thousands of positive reviews and plentiful social media testimonials, however, there are true believers among the internet-magic curious.

“Part of me obviously has lost faith when it comes to relationships, so knowing that it gave me a little bit of hope,” Mejia said, adding, “I don’t think it’s fake, I think it’s real.”

Turning to the mystical when other avenues to success seem blocked

Meija told me that she’s turning to witches to manifest companionship and job security in a tough market for both. Assuming most of the Etsy reviews are written by real people, she isn’t alone. Many of the sellers have thousands of reviews and average between 4.5 and 5 stars. Some happy customers said spells helped them pass an exam, land a new role, dismiss a traffic ticket, have a sunny bachelorette weekend, or feel a little bit less stressed. Most said they are still eagerly awaiting their results.

In the most recently available 2017 Pew survey of American adults, 41% of respondents said they believed in psychics, 42% said they thought spiritual energy could be located in physical things, and 29% said they believed in astrology. A 2019 IPSOS survey also found that nearly half of respondents said they believed in ghosts. My colleague Emily Stewart wrote about this last summer: It isn’t new that people are willing to shell out money on magic.

But the latest success of Etsy witches may be a sign of the times. Americans of all ages have told Business Insider in recent months that they’re frustrated by long job searches, feeling nervous about finances, or holding off on big life decisions like having babies and starting a business because the economy feels unpredictable. Consumer sentiment markers dipped in July, and employees are less confident in their companies lately. Another Pew survey conducted last September found that 16% of adults feel lonely all or most of the time, with higher rates among Gen Z and millennials. Bailey said he isn’t surprised that people are keen for an extra chance at financial stability, love, and relationships right now.

“When you’re feeling particularly uncertain, you’re more inclined to the ‘try anything’ approach,” he said, adding that magic has long been a way people try to “swing the odds in their favor.”

Thirty-six hours after I submitted my order, my witch sent me photo proof that my spell had been cast: an altar with a brightly-lit green candle, some crystals, and a couple of tarot cards. Over DM on the Etsy website, she told me I have “powerful support from the Universe,” and the “The Luck Alignment Ritual” has been activated, “so it is done, Amen.”

All she needed from me was my birthday, two sentences about my intention, and a working credit card. We never talked, and I don’t know what she looks like. That seems to be the case for most witches: you can order luck off the internet with a transaction that looks a lot like buying a Shein haul or bowl of DoorDashed pad thai.

The whole thing felt spooky, and I’m not convinced Etsy magic is the healthiest way to cope with anxiety. But if I find an affordable apartment with laundry, I might be willing to credit divine intervention.

Do you have a story to share about Etsy witches or how you spend your money? Reach out to this reporter at allisonkelly@businessinsider.com or via Signal at alliekelly.10

• America is in a dating slump: It’s expensive, apps aren’t helpful, and we’re not meeting organically.
• Dating apps can lead to prolonged messaging, missed connections, and loneliness.
• One simple solution can help combat these woes: It’s time to set up our friends.

Elena Vargas is saving her friend from Hinge messaging purgatory.

When the friend said they were too busy to weed through all the profiles, Vargas took control of the app, swiping for her, and arranging meetups — with the disclaimer that they were communicating with an unpaid matchmaker, of course.

Vargas, who is 30 and on the dating scene herself in San Francisco, sees it as a modern twist on matchmaking.

“Dating is scary,” Vargas, said, adding: “But when you have someone kind of doing the heavy lifting for you, the matching, the setting up, the setting the date, the setting the reservation — I feel like when all you have to do is show up and be yourself, it just takes everything out of it and it just makes it so much more enjoyable.”

All too often, Vargas said, people never make it off the apps. They end up with pen pals, texting endlessly until the spark fizzles out. There’s also the newly added step of checking your potential dates’ reviews.

She’s onto something. With dating app burnout rampant, and the costs to meet a new mate only rising, it’s time to take matters into our own hands with good old-fashioned matchmaking and setting up our friends. Whether it’s taking over a friend’s Hinge account or swapping “elevator pitches” between mutuals, people are fed up with swiping and looking for more meaningful ways to connect.

It’s time to consider a time-honored tradition: Matchmaking.

Setting up your friends is a public service

Terence Philpotts is a single 41-year-old promoter who lives in North Carolina. He’s an avid traveler and would love to meet someone new in person.

“People simply don’t go out as much as they used to,” he said. “And I mean, I’m just as at fault as anyone else.”

Philpotts said that his best relationship came from being set up by a mutual friend, and he’s open to trying it again. After all, dating is expensive, he said. And risky; a setup is more efficient.

“The person knows both of us, they know our nuances, they know what we, what we don’t like, and most people would think that they would find their friends compatible with each other,” he said. “And that’s basically what happened there.”

Experiences like Philpotts’ used to be a lot more common, but the apps took over as the dominant matchmaker for heterosexual couples in the 2000s, per the findings of a seminal study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

They brought with them a new dilemma: the pen pal stage. Scott Sibley, a professor at Northern Illinois University who teaches human development and family sciences — as well as being a licensed marriage and family therapist — said that one of the big hurdles facing daters is a prolonged talking stage. Potential daters are substituting dates for digital conversation instead.

Though Sibley’s research on relationships found that singles want to move beyond the talking stage, they’re hamstrung by a fear of rejection. It’s easier to hide behind a never-ending conversation than it is to actually get out there.

“That’s the funny thing,” Sibley said. “They’d rather be going on dates and being asked on dates.”

The mismatch between expectations and reality could be fueling the loneliness epidemic. According to a Gallup survey of 6,289 Americans from August through September 2024, around a fifth of US adults said that they had experienced loneliness a lot in the previous day.

Some seem to be taking some proactive action; the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ American Time Use Survey shows that younger Americans are spending less time alone, although they’re still spending far more time solo than they did prior to the pandemic.

But you can help do your part to fight America’s dating drought, Damona Hoffman, a Los Angeles-based dating coach, said.

“People are so down on dating apps right now and are looking for ways to connect offline or feeling nostalgic for an old-fashioned meet-cute cute so why not try your hand at making a match?” Hoffman said. “Even if they don’t end up madly in love, they could make a meaningful connection in another way or become friends.”

Daniel Cox, the director of the Survey Center on American Life at the American Enterprise Institute, is writing a book about the growing divide between men and women, especially when it comes to dating. He said that what they’ve been hearing is that the online experience is “terrible.” Folks are more likely to treat each other as expendable in what seems like an infinite sea of choices. That’s where a return to form, or an embrace of a new form of dating, might come in. Cox’s research has found that young women are especially more likely to date through their social circles.

“There’s a recognition that we have a better chance of success or at least a better chance of success, or at least a better chance of having a good time if we’re dating people who are friends of friends,” Cox said, “people who are in our social circle, who have some sense of obligation to treat us well and respectfully.”

How to set up your friends

How people meet has evolved, but the trajectory of relationships still follows a standard formula.

Brian Ogolsky, a professor of human development and family studies at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, summarized it like this: we meet, we flirt, we do the dance around defining the relationship, we end it, or become exclusive.

“As long as I’ve been studying relationships, which is now pushing 30 years, and even when we look at historical ways, that trajectory looks sort of very similar,” he said.

Hoffman said that a good setup should rest on what she deems the four pillars of long-term compatibility: “Common goals, shared values, communication styles, and mutual respect.” Look past what might be surface-level chemistry — like a shared love of sushi or hiking — and dig deeper into their beliefs, hopes, and openness to a relationship. As a friend, you may have unique insight into that.

Amy Nobile Messing, a dating coach based in New York, said that if you’re setting up a friend, you should ask for their elevator pitch — a paragraph about themselves and maybe a photo to share. The other person should do the same; there should be no surprises.

Even so, as Hoffman said, singles should also solicit setups from folks in their orbit; Hoffman calls it their “connector’s circle.”

Hoffman and Messing both agree that once you set up the friends, your job is done. If it doesn’t work out, that’s fine. You shouldn’t end up in a position where you’re fielding feedback or trying to control the situation.

Of course, setting up your friends is not necessarily a bulletproof solution. As Anna Goldfarb, the author of “Modern Friendship: How to Nurture Our Most Valued Connections,” said, there’s always the risk that your friend sets you up with someone who ends up being a dud, or your friends who get together break up and create a sticky social situation. There’s also the unpredictable nature of when sparks fly.

“That’s sort of the beauty of romance — sometimes there’s these intangibles that I couldn’t possibly predict,” Goldfarb said. “With that said, my parents were set up on a blind date by friends, so I am here in this universe because of blind dates. I think it can happen.”

For Vargas, who’s been setting up her friend via Hinge from across the country, the exercise has led to some dates. While none have translated into a romantic relationship yet, it’s led to new friendships and the ability to get to know the city better.

“I feel like she’s also gained a little bit more confidence in going on the dates and also just her ability to talk with people and see, oh, actually now I know I would rather prefer this, or I would want this instead,” Vargas said.