Nothing empties a wallet faster than ‘I’m just trying it out.
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Well if I stop buying fishing gear, at some point it’ll be financially worth it. I mean I’ve already “paid off” the license for this year. Yup… Ignore the brand new rod and reel I got for black Friday, it was on discount. Or the fact that I got a gold membership discount at the local tackle store because I spent enough money in a year.
But think of all the money you saved eating the fish you caught, and other lies we tell ourselves, available 2026
I mean, we did legitimately save a lot of money this summer. Catch of the day in an overpriced seaside vacation area is not cheap at all.
The rest of the year though…
My hobby are maths and programming, both fairly cheap. Other than the cost of getting a computer of course (and maybe some maths textbooks if you feel the need)
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You can do maths and programming on a very cheap pc, don’t necessarily need an expensive PowerPC with i dunno which graphics card is currently the hype
I’d love to just fall into enough money to:
- Retire
- Pay off my house
- Hire a maid
Then hobbies begin. Options:
- Tabletop games, buy book, gear and host games
- woodworking, furniture
- Backyard forging
- leather working
- make a video game
My brother gifted me his old motorcycle. I know it is gona try and kill me. Spent more money on safety gear that what it would have cost to buy the bike. Then there is tires, $300 to 500 Chain and sprockets $250ish Then I need a adapter to fix the speedometer $200ish And then and then then… Not complaining but man this is either a hobby or a car that needs way more maintenance
For me it’s been mechanical keyboards as of late.
Maybe I should start stocking up on GMK sets - those seem to resell nicely.
Add two more shovels and you have home ownership
Spending money on hobbies is fine, change my mind.
no. we must spend money on bills then sit motionless until next shift.
The only people deserving fun are the billionaires.
Peasants, all of them! You have to be a 5T corporation to afford any fun.
And the only thing they enjoy is our suffering.
Tastes like spaghetti, I hear.
Yes but they get such a great deal!
They (and I just did the math) could higher all of humanity at minimum wage for 4 years without having to make a drop of income!
and since it is all software they don’t even have any material cost.
At those prices why not buy humanity?
Get into videogames, then you can do both
not with prices about to explode. we will probably have to risk thoughts occurring now.
… so long as it does not materially impact your ability to provide basic necessities for your own wellbeing, food, water, shelter, some level of climate control, etc.
… and you are not directly, indirectly, or functionally spending other people’s money on your hobbies.
No. I agree with you
Spending disposable money on hobbies is fine
I’d say spending SOME money and time on your most fulfilling hobbies is damn near a necessity for a healthy existence.
And yeah sure, plenty of people don’t do that, and plenty of people literally cannot afford to do that here in my dear old US of A.
But you know what else I see a lot of people doing in the US? Fighting mental illness and talking ever more openly about the need for revolution and violence.
As long as “spending money” isn’t the hobby and you actually use it otherwise it’s a waste of resources.
there has to be a list of hobbies one can try that cost practically nothing:
Solving Rubik cubes (a high quality speedcube is about 20$)
Crocheting/stitching (needles and yarn after cheap)
Writing (free)
programming
… (please expand if you have any ideas)
Reading (libraries)
Crocheting/knitting is cheap to try out but once you really get into it (and start worrying about yarn quality and so on), the money pit opens. Ask me how I know.
As someone who owns a spinning wheel, you can dye and spin yarn at home to make the money pit even wider and deeper!
Isn’t spinning your own yarn an amount of work that you should be saving money? 😂
It depends.
It isn’t that yarn in itself is expesive, but if you’re knitting/weaving, you’re not doing it to save money on socks, you want to make something cool and unique. If you really get into it, you’re going to eventually want that specialist wool/bamboo/elastane blend with a super specific colour grade and maybe a specific manufacturing method too. And that’s expensive.
Similarly, if you’re spinning your own yarn, you can get boring old for about half the price of boring old yarn, and even less if you dye big batches yourself. You can get a pretty nice wool for about a quarter of the price of the yarn, so far so good. But of course, if you’re spinning your own yarn, you’re going not doing that for production purposes, you want to make something cool and unique. So you’ll want to blend in specifics, like glitter nylons, or maybe even metalic fibers, and that long-fiber, ultra-fine angora will go great with a slightly thicker cairngorn, etc etc. And before you know it, you’re making yarn that costs maybe ten times what they sell at the local hobby shop.
And spinning wheels aren’t exactly cheap either. Mine was something like 800 euros, but you can easily spend four times that on an electric wheel. You can buy a LOT of yarn for that money. And lets not talk about how much wool I’ve ruined due to lack of skill while learning.
Or, if you want to do it for historical purposes, you’re going to want kinda-shitty, historically accurate materials like hemp or flax or wool from sheep that aren’t really all that suited for wool-making, and are probably not even kept anywhere anymore outside of niche hobby flocks. And then you want to process it yourself. And it’s surprisingly hard to fine someone who will just sell you flax-the-plant.
My wife has enlisted friends to help me sell her yarn stash if she dies before me. There’s probably 10 large worth of high value dye lots sitting in bins around me. Her work includes a $200/month yarn shop stipend, and has for many years now.
Yep. Often when I wear a new jumper or whatever around people who know I knit, I get asked ‘oh, that’s pretty, did you make it?’
Lol no, that would have cost me like 5 times more. I couldn’t afford to make it myself.
is that just the value of your time or are you considering you’d use the fanciest yarn too?
It’s not considering the value of my time; a decent (actually wearable) yarn is far more expensive than most people think.
I would consider it a waste of my time to spend a couple hundred hours on a garment that’s barely wearable because it’s uncomfortable and borderline not washable. That’s what you will get with any yarn that won’t cost you over $50 in materials for a simple pattern.
Cheap yarns are fine for beginner projects that aren’t made to be worn, but if you’re putting that much of your effort into a garment meant to be used, you should not be using bargain yarn. Your effort is worth too much to sabotage yourself that way.
eta: oh, if you’re wondering (like I did) why knitting something in polyester would be different from store-bought garments in what seems like the same material, it’s mostly in the weight of the yarn, and partly in how insanely uniform machine knitting is. That creates a radically different fabric than even the most skilled human could produce, and small deviations in either yarn weight or technique have radical differences in the fabric. There are knitting techniques that produce highly artistic texture by doing nothing but varying yarn tension.
TIL! I want to get my niece some pretty yarn (she’s just getting in to crochet) but i have no idea how to choose. I just go by “ooo pretty” and “ooo soft” and if it scores high on both, i get it for her. so far so good.
Natural yarns are almost always best for wearables. It doesn’t need to be fancy (other than ooo pretty, which is my biggest criteria, too). I’d avoid 100% polyester, or high blends.
Personally, I love knitting with bamboo blends, and they’re quite affordable. They’re not suited for everything, but many feel like silk whilst wearing like cotton. And they’re often more sustainable.
It doesn’t wear as well as wool or cashmere in all contexts, but it’s affordable and very pleasant to knit with (eta: sometimes especially beginners have issues with lower end wools, which might be scratchy and which can cause friction issues in sensitive finger folds). I’d say bamboo is miles better for a beginner than polyester, and often comparably priced.
ok but that’s in you for getting expensive yarn.
Nah, honestly anything better than the bottom-of-the-barrel acrylics is going to add up quickly when you buy enough of it to make something like a sweater. If you want to use natural fibers (wool, cotton, I’ll take bamboo too) that’s a large jump in price, even if you’re not getting anything too fancy. And I feel like if I’m going to spend months hand-knitting a sweater, I don’t want to end up with something that’s all plastic and will degrade in a year.
I do also have some fancy hand-dyed yarns that were properly expensive and these ones are indeed 100% on me :P But they’re not really what I’m talking about here.
Oh yeah, most people just have no clue how much yarn is needed or how much time it takes to make even a fairly simple item
I tried getting into knitting once, and really appreciated that the entry bar is so cheap. I never made the jump for more expensive yarn, life got in the way and stopped.
Not no-cost but cooking, gotta feed yourself anyway might as well have fun with it
Cooking is cost negative relative to eating out. You just need a decent kitchen and plenty of free time
Drawing, pencil and paper for start and drawing tablets are not that expensive for starter ones and there’s free open source drawing software.
D&D costs $90 for the hard cover core book set and $0 for the pirated pdfs.
Biking can have a high upfront cost, but I’ve been using the same bike for 20 years with tune-ups and replacements running in the low three figures over that time.
I’m a big fan of podcasts, particularly ones that cover old movies. Criterion collection films are everywhere, they’re dirt cheap, and they’re classics for a reason.
There are cheaper and better TTRPGs.
Not much is cheaper than free
All the other ones also have copies floating on the great seas, and some are just plain free
Sure. But those are the ones I’m most inclined to pay for.
Okay but you didn’t lead with free and as someone else pointed out that’s a moot point when you’re pirating.
SJ Games has GURPS Lite, a free version of their 4th edition. It’s very simplified, but easily playable.
Drawing (we should stop pretending one need expensive material do draw nice things, pencils and erasers are the only requirement, and a good sketch book can be found for less than 15 bucks)
who even says that drawing is expensive? it’s so obviously cheap thing to do. we did it so much as children. if it was expensive no kids would be allowed to draw
Just look into anything that professional artists use. I have had the privilege of using my mom’s coloring pencils ever since I was around 5, and the full package (120 pencils) of those is almost 500€. I don’t use fancy drawing papers, but those are expensive as well.
every hobby can be as expensive as you want it to be. the cost ceiling is however much the richest person doing that hobby is willing to spend.
if 2 billionaires want to get into drawing as they are willing to spend a million for a box of fancy cryons, those products will appear in the market. even though they’ll be marginally better than those 500$ onces
but the question was about the cost of entry. and with drawing, the cost is negligible
I see some influencers bragging about why you’d need quality markers like posca to improve your drawing skills. My bros fell for it and beg me to buy some for them.
It’s like thoses ads telling you you need product to do thing better. Even if it’s quality, it doesn’t work this way.
I bought a $25 set of 8 for them. They used it 2 times then stopped because they couldn’t make what they wanted. They are now asking for a light tablet to “draw better”. They will have to buy it themselves if they really want it. I was fine with the window light when i was their age.
People somehow always find a way to make the simplest thing expensive with half-useless material.
Amen. You have to stay away from that toxic commercialisation. It messes with your brain and stalls your progress in any hobby.
I think one of the best things about arts, crafts, sports, music and the like is that it has a built in resistance to that kind of commercial takeover. Having good pens will not make you better at art, good shoes won’t make you better at soccer, a fancier gym won’t give you bigger muscles. These things come from hard work, perseverance, dedication. You can’t buy skill no matter goes much money you have, I love that.
I do like using nice tools though, although they are overkill for most hobbyist purposes.
I’d probably only buy quality tools if I could afford it, even if I wouldn’t need them necessarily.
That ain’t bragging that’s product placement. they ruin everything they touch.
Hiking? I mean, the world is just out there.
Other outside activities that need minimal equipment come to mind. You ever played discgolf? Or went running? Or geocaching?
But yeah, lots of activities aren’t expensive. Draw something. Paint something. Sing! Or do some sports! Yoga only requires a mat if you do it naked.
although the entry bar is theoretically non existent. practically? not really.
How so?
I agree that in some conditions, entry is practically free. Assuming you have comfortable walking shoes and a backpack and assuming you leave near some trails.
Otherwise shoes and basic equipment for jut getting into it might cost a few 100$. not expensive, but I would not say free entry.
I hike in sandals I got for $11 on rollback at Walmart. I don’t think most people need a backpack for hikes that are going to be a few hours at most. Bring a granola bar in your pocket if you really need food. Most people have some sort of bag that can carry things, it doesn’t have to be a backpack.
oh, I used to do a lot of hiking.
Didn’t consider a short hour long walk a hike.
I guess those ones do practically have no entry bar. given that everyone already likely has clothes capable of handling that.
“needles/yarn after cheap”
That’s a lie. My wife is into knitting and crochet, I’ve seen $300 purchases for yarn only, for just one dress. Not to mention $50-100 needles or swifts or yarn caking tools
I got caught up on that too.
I don’t do anything with yarn, but will sometimes use fabric to make puppets and other toys with my kid.
Even buying the cheapest fabric from the lowest priced outlets (cheaper than even the random alphabet soup brands on amazon) in bulk, it adds up so fast when you’re actually creating things!
Software development is free if you already have a computer
Writing (free)
Maybe if you only write in dirt with your finger. Orherwise you need writing implements and something to write on.
Actually free things you can do:
-
Walking/running
-
Stare
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Singing
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Collecting rocks
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Stare
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Sleeping
If you’re reading this in a computer, then you already have what you need. otherwise, it’s like you said, the cheapest thing on the list
For walking/running you need proper shoes.
Pretty sure people were walking and running long before shoes ever were invented.
pretty sure they walked in dirt, and not concrete roads.
But if you dont want to go bankrupt over medical bills, you should have the right shoes to provide support
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IMO piracy and self hosting has great cost benefits.
Sure it costs money to buy a mini computer and a hard drive, but after, you can spend a long time building that library and it won’t cost you a dime.
And the computer and hard drive is more like an asset, you don’t really lose money when you buy it.
And it kind of pays you back, eventually you get a little tired of building your library but then you can use said library and integrate it into your lifestyle while you get a new obsession.
also, there’s a high when you hoard data like a dragon
And what’s great about it is that it’s a positive sum game, you being a data dragon only ensures it’s easier for others (seeding and it becoming a trend).
Basic concepts like property or ownership make absolutely no sense in the digital world.
By letting people hoard files like a greedy dragon those files are infinitely more available to everyone, in a decentralized network that is free to use and is superior (in content, efficiency, speed, cost) to every for profit company that streams content.
but that smoking monkey was mine i tells ya mine
There are plenty of hobbies where you can happily enjoy it and only ever spend little if anything.
On the other hand, I’ve found it’s pretty uncommon to find a hobby where you can’t optionally fall down an expensive rabbit-hole of some kind, usually around any kind of equipment or tools you might need as part of some hobby.
Thankfully for most hobbies that kind of thing is not required to enjoy it. You don’t need a fancy guitar to enjoy playing; you can read books from the library, you don’t need to collect your own; in most big enough cities (in Europe at least) you don’t even need to own a bike to go for a cycle (though regularly using bike rental schemes might be a sign to try and get a bike, doesn’t need to be fancy)
all hobbies have a cost floor for entry and a cost ceiling. one is the actual cost, and the other one is a made up number based on the richest person who does that hobby.
Entirely seriously, learn how to make a game in Godot.
Its literally completely free, only costs you time, and assumes you have at least some kind of existing computer, doesn’t need to be a monster rig.
Alternatively: Find a video game you like.
Make mods for it.
Here’s another one that’s basically free:
Becoming/Staying fit, gaining strength and agility.
Make ‘weights’ out of milk jugs with water in them.
Maybe get a resistance band or two, they’re not that pricey.
You can absolutely do a ton of stretches, calisthenics, and light to modetate muscle group workouts with basically just random shit lying around a typical home or apartment.
You can find basic guides for these excercises often just freely available from reputable medical organizations.
You can literally just go on a 20 minute walk, 3 times a week, and be in better physical shape than something like half of the US adult population.
Back to computer shit:
Blender is free.
Learn 3D modelling, rigging, UV wrapping, how texturing works, how to make animations, etc.
Same with Krita.
Become artist. Draw stuff good.
You can find probably literally millions of free tutorials for how to do basic and intermediate level concepts.
Whsitling/Singing/Voice Acting.
These are developable skills much more so than they are just… things you either can or cannot do, for some reason.
You can teach yourself how to do these, again to a basic or intermediate level, for pretty much free.
Same thing with at least some kinds of dancing.
If you’re feeling more EXTREME: Parkour and/or Urbex.
Lockpicking.
Go find the Lockpicking Lawyer on youtube.
Pretty sure he can recommend you a not too pricey basic starter kit for learning the basics.
… I could go on, but my hands are tired from what I’m going to call ‘autism posting’, one of my totally free, personal hobbies that I often indulge in.
music, cooking, public librarying (that’s too complicated for one post)
Ceramics is stupidly cheap to get into. All the tools can be replaced with your hands and a needle, finding workable clay in nature is stupidly easy if you know what to look for and even the garbage clay can be made usable. Most ceramic shops let you rent a shelf on the kiln for like $5. Your first ceramic statue is literally 2 hours of research and $5 away no matter where you are in the world.
finding workable clay in nature is stupidly easy if you know what to look for
Workable clay may be hundreds of kilometers away, depending on where you live.
I mean, I’m in the Netherlands, i literally can’t avoid the stuff, but not everyone lives in a giant river delta.
like me. i live in two giant river deltas. we have clay for days here. one time, this punk kid brought a pit bull to the neighbors and it attacked my cat. this cat had beaten up a lot of dogs including a retired police german shepherd, so it just stared down the dog. then got shook around like a ragdoll while it removed much of the dog’s face.
worst punishment we could think of was making the kid dig the grave. after two inches you hit clay. we made him go four feet deep. never saw him with a dog again, so between us and his parents something stuck.
So I’m stretching the term “nature” here because when I was posting this I actually completely forgot about real natural clay by rivers. You can also get workable clay from any large amount of sand over dirt that’s gotten wet enough times. The water pulls silica out of the sand and into the earth over time, then you can wash it to get the extra crap out, decant off the water, dry the slip, and boom clay.
Some of the best clay I’ve used came from under an old school playground.
Papercraft is pretty cool. If you have some thick card stock paper, a printer, a knife, and some glue, you can find 3D designs online for almost anything. I made an IL2 Sturmovik.
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Any art or craft or sport is pretty much free when you weigh up the hours vs the outlay required.
Except skiing and motorsports. That eats money.
or boating, or equestrianism, or space travel.
Skiing can be cheap if you just happen to be local to where you want to go. Used equipment can be cheap and last a long while and season tickets can be a good bargain on a per day basis at that point. I used to do that when I lived basically on a ski mountain.
But then you catch the bug and then you have to plan out $2000+ trips just to be able to do that once after you move away.
Cooking is basically better than free.
Yes, ingredients and equipment cost money, but the end result averages out to be cheaper than if you didn’t know how to cook. And even if you take on more expensive ingredients or tools, you’re probably offsetting even more expensive restaurant meals that you would’ve eaten.
Birdwatching. You can buy a book and binoculars if you like. The app Merlin is somewhat free to ID Birdwatching calls. Birdseed can get expensive or just plant sunflowers.
Wildflower identification. Best in early spring, Phone apps make this a little too easy. Seed collecting and propagation is my next goal. I also pull up invasive plants, mostly garlic mustard.
Gardening. Seeds are cheap but if want to start indoors you’ll need a light and possibly a heat mat. Start outdoors in a makeshift “greenhouse” using a clear plastic jug. Starter plants are cheap
Digital art. Potentially expensive at first, but if you already have a working computer, tablet, or even a phone, all you need¹ is to buy a drawing tablet, which can have a screen or not², and the screenless ones are way cheaper!
When it comes to software, I’d recommend Krita or ibisPaint (for phones) which are free (Krita is free and open-source - no ads, ibisPaint is free as in “it costs $0 but has ads”). There are lots of other software for digital art, and basically everything other than Adobe software (🤮) shouldn’t be super expensive.
¹ You can use a mouse or a touchscreen instead if you can’t buy a drawing tablet - they’re not great to draw with but still viable for the hobby.
² You’d think a screenless tablet would be hard to get used to, but after some practice you get used to it.
Tablets with a screen are harder to use for me since they make me cover part of my view with my hand.
Well, strangling animals, golf and masturbating.
Golf??
I lived in Aberdeen, Scotland, the birthplace of golf, the barrier to entry was non existent. Practically everyone there golfs. when it is a nice day they just walk to the nearest golf course (there are like 6 in the city itself), and play, stick collection? you just need like 3 to begin and you can get the from charity shops for like £40. No one uses those eclectic golf carts they see them as abominations and ruins the sport (the whole point is to walk about 5 km, if you skip that then it is not a sport, they are allowed in some places for accessibility).
In the rest of the world? rich people sport
all of those are non like the others
Choking the chicken? It’s two hobbies in one
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Disc golf can be really cheap so long as you just stick to the basics. Lots of free courses or courses that cost like $5 if they’re nice. Basically spent $50 once and then nothing past that. Found a some free discs too that didn’t have any owner identification on them :)
My hobby is buying materials for projects and then not doing the projects.
Is this the more adult version of buying games on Steam and never playing them?
yes, but I do that too.
Ah, a fine hobby indeed! I have so many arduinos, pis, and various modules strewn about with little to show for it.
As an amateur radio operator, I can confirm this as factual. Over.
If you want to save money, don’t get into bird photography as a hobby. Gear Acquisition Syndrome is fatal to your wallet.
Oh no, the birb left a leg on the beach. Gotta buy a new lens to do better next time.
Please no. I like my kidneys. The next lens up in quality is over $15,000.
That’s why you steal someone else’s kidneys!
Of course, then you’ll need to develop a collection of surgical gear, and likewise you would want to improve that with time…after all, why not take pride in your work?
Ope, time to switch to a new body with a different lens mount then, haha
You could fit so many more birdies into a medium format sensor!
My ex decided to take up photography. She’s now essentially semi-pro and it was a terrible financial decision for all involved.
Christmas lists started to get reeeal aspirational. No, you are not getting a lense that’s the financial equivalent of a decent used car for Christmas. Go shoot more gigs and weddings.
Nope, if you can’t do it adequately with a cell phone camera, it’s gonna eat you alive.
I’m not doing much photography now but I was way into it a decade ago. I did it professionally on the side, which helped justify some of my nice full-frame gear. It’s nice when taking photos at a dimly lit wedding reception.
Your mention of Gear Aquisition Syndrome followed by a picture of a motherfucking peregine falcon in flight still took my breath away for a second there!
It’s a Barn Swallow, not a Peregrine. Closer, faster horizontally, and smaller. I’ve got a few Peregrine photos, though none I’m particularly happy with yet.
Ah, my mistake. Thanks!
MTG really fits the shoveling cash into a furnace thing
What did Margorie Taylor Greene do again?
Breathing #1. She should probably stop that.
Unfortunately yes. I used to play many years ago, loved (and still love) the game format. But after the release of modern masters at the price they did, I knew things would never get better. Wizards and Hasbro are in on the card evaluation market. They could, at ANY time, squash it. They decided to foster it
I consider myself lucky.
When my friends were first trying to persuade me to get into MtG I went to a LGS to get a starter pack.
A guy came in with a sports bag full of ‘his green swaps’ to see what price he could get for them.
That was the point where I realised I’d dip my toe in the water but this wasn’t going to be a serious hobby for me.
Software development is cheap, if you already own a PC, which is the most expensive part if you go with open source tools.
It’s free until you start wasting money on hosting and domains, for websites that no one will ever visit.
I don’t want to know how much I would be paying, if I didn’t have a home server with fiber internet.
And here’s me thinking software development is a career 😭 good for you though. How did you get into it as a hobby?
Learned it in college, first hated it because Java + webapps + PHP, then I discovered system programming through game development.
Until you get into embedded programming and electronics…
Thankfully my hobby is video games so I really only have to buy something to play them on and then I can search for the One Piece if you catch my drift.
Video games are a cheap hobby they said. So many options they said…
Strongly dependent on you. I’m on the other side of the spectrum. I rarely buy full price games and only those with long playtime. Makes a very efficient €/h investment compared to other hobbies.
If you buy every CoD, EA gane or whatever each year and another full price release every month you’re financially screwed though.
To be fair, I rarely buy games over $10, and frequently even that is a stretch. I’ve built my library heavily from bundles. It’s still a decent amount when you look at it as a single lump sum, but it’s also the entirety of my entertainment budget and it’s been obtained fairly steadily over a period of 13 years. Per hour it’s still pretty cheap.
Great to hear that you didn’t bankrupt yourself by building this incredible collection. Got some of those bundles myself, often pretty worth it even if you only want one of those games.
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