What is restocking? Restocking is, by definition, buying cheap items from official Neopian shops and reselling them in your shop to make a profit.

Is it a good way to make Neopoints? Many people use it as their primary method. It can be very profitable, but it takes speed, skill, patience, and lots of luck. If you get very lucky, you could buy a rare item worth as much as millions. That is the pinnacle of expert restocking.

Can anyone do it? Anyone has the ability to do it. However, if your account is new you will not be able to see all the items available in shops. At three months account age you can see all items.

Where do I do it? If you are a beginner, I would suggest the book shop as a place to start. Intermediate players might try the chocolate and toy shops, while advanced restockers would try the coin, magic, or stamp shops. It is a personal preference where you try to restock. A majority of Neopian shops sell items that will always yield a profit when resold. However, not all shops are a good deal and you should try to have a basic knowledge of which items are worthless and bad deals to buy.

How do I know which items are good deals? USUALLY a rare item stands out from others because of its price and number in stock. This is not always the case, but usually a 10,000 NP item among 500 NP items is rare and should be dived for. If an item's price is drastically different, or if there is only one in stock, it is most likely rare. For example, any book in the book shop worth 5,000-10,000 NP is almost sure to be a great deal.

How do I know which items are bad deals? If you see items in a shop, look at the number in stock. If there is over 10 of an item in stock, chances are it is a common item and will not yield much profit if you buy it. If there is 20+ of an item in stock it is most likely a bad deal. However, bad items can sometimes stock in small numbers. If an item that only has 2 or 3 in stock stays in the shop for 10+ seconds after refreshing the page, it is most likely a bad deal and could have been sitting there all day. Examples include potions, battle items, and non-wearable clothing items. If something is very expensive and only has 1-3 in stock, but has been sitting for over 10 seconds, it will probably lose you a LOT of Neopoints if bought.

What if I buy an item that is a bad deal? If you buy an item that is worth less than what you bought it for there is nothing you can do but learn from the mistake. You can still resell the item, you just won't make a profit.

How do I do it? You simply click the item you want to buy. This brings up a screen to haggle. Type in a number close to what the shopkeeper wants, then click the pet to confirm your purchase. That is a very simplified explanation. My tutorial in the next step will explain better. Know, however, that you could be competing with as many as hundreds of people for the same item, so you need to be the fastest entering your numbers if you want to actually get an item.

So speed is the biggest factor? Correct. Speed is key in restocking. Fast internet connection helps, but it's not the end of the game if you have a slower connection. You can still restock.

I keep going to shops but it says there's no items. Shops restock randomly on an 8-minute timer. Every 8 minutes a shop gets new items. These items move FAST. Many shops will only have items stocked for about 30 seconds before they are sold out. So many people are competing for the same items that they are ripped off the shelves. If there are no items in a shop it means you missed the 8-minute restock and will have to wait for the next window to try and grab an item. So think about it this way: a shop will only have items for about 30 seconds, then it goes through a 7 minute 30 second period of having no items at all. You will have to be patient and keep refreshing at the shop constantly.

1. Choose your store, find an item. For the purpose of this tutorial I am using the Tiki Tack Shop on Mystery Island. NEVER BUY FROM TIKI TACK. The items are a terrible value and most of them are really worth 1 NP. The only reason why I am using this terrible shop is because the items of such bad value that they are always in stock, and so I can easily take screenshots. A list of shops that are actually GOOD places to restock at can be found later on. Use your imagination and pretend that the bottle of green sand in my screenshot is a rare item that I am rushing to buy. If this were any other shop, you'd have to be much faster. Click on the item and a screen will pop up.


Just click OK or hit enter as fast as you can to be taken to the next "haggle" screen.

2. Haggle; enter the price to pay for the item. The next screen is called the "haggle" screen. This is where you type in the number of the price you want to pay for the item. When buying an item, notice that is already has a price before you click on it. That is just the shopkeeper's recommended base price. You can go slightly lower or higher. The shopkeeper wants 263 NP for the sand in my example. (What a bad deal!) You will see something like the screenshot here to the left.

Click on the offer box as fast as you can. You need to type a number that is slightly lower than the base price, but that is mindlessly fast to type. No need to erase the zero, just click after it. Your goal is to go as fast as possible, not waste time haggling for a cheaper price. If you haggle too low or too high, the shopkeeper will reject your offer and bring you back to the haggling screen. Making a typo or going too high/low can lose you an item in a second, so it is important to be focused and know the ranges of haggles that will be accepted. Never go more than 100 NP off an item that has a base price lower than 1,000 NP. You can go slightly more off if the item is more expensive. It's based on percentages, so you could easily get 200 NP off an item that costs 4,000 NP, but not off an item that costs 300 NP. Since my bottle of sand costs 263 NP originally, I'm going to try for 233 NP. 233 is a very fast number to type since 2 is next to 3. The easiest way to haggle is to type the closest numbers together on the keyboard. Try combinations such as 222, 233, etc... anything fast to type that is close to the original asking price.

Depending on how fast you haggled, you will see one of these two screens:


Congratulations! You may have just restocked your first item. As for me, I am now the new owner of a Bottle of Green Sand.

3. Sell your restocked item. The whole point is to resell items in your shop to make a profit. Most items you buy will give you at least a small profit, depending on how rare they are. Go to your inventory, put the item in your shop, and then head over to the Shop Wizard. If you don't know about the Shop Wizard, you will need to use it to price items at a common average. To the left is a screenshot of the Shop Wizard. Type in your item name and select "Identical to my Phrase" from the dropdown menu. This is important! You can ignore pretty much everything else. Hit "search" to see your results. The Shop Wizard searches only one chunk of Neopian shops at a time, so you may have to search more than once to get the true price of an item. I like to search three or more times to price every item.

After a few searches for my "Bottle of Green Sand" sample, this is the result. The screenshot to the right shows the average prices for the sand. When pricing items, you want to be close to the average but beat it slightly. If I were to price the sand in my shop, I would ask for 10 NP based on the Shop Wizard's findings. Since I paid 233 NP for the sand, I lose 223 NP by reselling it for 10 NP. I lost Neopoints because my example was not a good item to restock, but most of the time the Shop Wizard price will be much greater than the shop price.

Hopefully after this walkthrough you are familiar with the process of buying, haggling, and pricing items. Restocking is a great way to make a profit if you know what you're doing. Good luck; you'll need it!

Assume the "ready position. Keep your right hand on the mouse, refreshing every few seconds. Keep your left hand on the number keys, probably around the lower end. Sit up straight and keep a good posture. It can help your reflexes.

Play some music in the background. I like to play some music while restocking to set the mood and make me feel energized. It also helps calm me. Listening to music can help you focus and give you something to do that isn't distracting while refreshing.

Restock at multiple shops. If you focus on refreshing only one shop you will be very bored. Have multiple tabs up with many shops and make your own pattern of refreshing them. It helps to pass time, plus you're more likely to catch a restock than if you're just staring at one shop. Have fun with it. You can have many tabs up, even 10-20 different shops if you want.

Know how much NP to carry. Restocking is dangerous; you never know when you might get a Tax Beast or other NP loss event. Restocking requires carrying more Neopoints than usual, so be aware that you are always at risk for random events that take away a percentage. If you are doing basic restocking like books or foods, you shouldn't need more than 10,000 Neopoints or so out at one time. If you are restocking bigger items, however, like coins or potions, you will need to have many thousands out. Some battle shop items may even require over 200,000 NP to restock. Be careful.

Relax, refresh constantly. If you are very intent on restocking something good, refresh the shop window every two seconds. You will have to be fast to catch the best deals, as they go instantly. If you catch a shop JUST as it stocks you have the best chance to get a rare item. Don't count on others to make mistakes or hesitate; people know which items are rare and will dive for them. Try your best to stay calm and relax. If you are panicy and anxious you have more of a chance to slip up and miss a good deal, as I have many times.

Click the shopkeeper to refresh instead of the button on the page. It's faster than moving your mouse cursor off the item area to get to the browser's refresh button.

There is nothing you can do to be faster except practice. No one can give you tips on how to be faster. Internet connection is a small factor, but your reaction times are much more important. All you can do is practice. Over time I notice that I click faster and memorize which items are better deals. You will have to learn how to haggle in under 3 seconds.

Have patience, set limits. Restocking takes lots of practice, and you will have to be super-fast to get any rare items. Remember that it is a competition; many people are diving for the same item. Set healthy limits for yourself, such as a set time or Neopoint goal daily. It's easy to lose track of time and restock for hours straight. Neopets is just a game; have fun.