Auction houses are going mobile in 2026

For the first time in our cross-client dataset, mobile overtook desktop as the dominant surface for lot discovery — 62% of sessions, 55% of bids placed, 48% of total GMV. The pandemic dragged the curve forward; a new generation of collectors shipped it the final mile.

What that means for your catalog

Three things break on mobile that didn't on desktop:

1. Hero images. 16:9 lot images with centred text overlays fall apart on a 390-pt viewport. Use 1:1 or 4:5 crops and let the title render outside the frame.
2. Bid increments. The number pad on a phone turns every +$500 into a +$5000 risk. Your UI should show the computed next-bid value before the user taps, not after.
3. Session length. A mobile collector is browsing on a train. Your "recommended for you" rail matters more than it does on a 27" monitor — it's the only easy way to refill the queue.

What we built for it

Auction Rabbit's mobile client ships with watchlists, 30-second push notifications, biometric login, and server-driven pre-bid validation so stale tabs don't submit conflicting bids. The SDK is native (Swift / Kotlin) with React Native bindings for teams that want one codebase.