Kickstarter Reviews 1,256

I would give them a zero if I could. Pretty close to 100% SCAM these days. Take your money… prove 11-12 updates and fade away… you’ll never see a product and when you contact both the owner and the Kickstarter platform… you’ll never hear zip back. Clearly the platform gets paid on the front end and has no interest in ensuring any credibility on the platform. The more criminals they let on.. the better for them. Do NOT Back!!!’

Kickstarter is not liable if a creator fails to deliver a project.

You have to pay up front and will supposedly be sent the item once it goes into production.

Some items went into production and I received them.

However, most of the items, though paid for, were never sent to me.

True Scam, never again! How it works? You pledge for some really amazing products, funds leave your account once time is up...that's where it start...you get hooked on backers offer, usually 40% of RRP ,then you patently wait , in some cases months...till they finish production and start shipping. When you get it- you are over the moon, it does everything they said and more! Kicker? Here it comes.... Check Amazon, and you find the product already there ! Cheaper than what you gave! Feeling like you been taken for an idiot, rightfully so!

Scam Central. Money taken, nothing delivered.

I was one of 989 backers in 2024 who supported a campaign and made a pledge of $199 + $30 postage on Kickstarter.

Needless to say, the creator has ceased communication and no product was sent

Kickstarter have not helped.

SCAM, SCAM, SCAM, SCAM!

FYI, the product from DONGYING was a touchscreen projector which is now advertised on Temu.

I love participating in new research and being able to have new things on the market. But I do not like being scammed. These creators make prototypes and give a short window of delivery. They take our money and then all of a sudden we won't get it for 6 months. They know the windows have closed as far as a dispute so they drag it out as long as possible. I will not participate in one more kickstarter product, The brush it off to the creator when the creator did not collect our money Kickstarted did. I have three projects outstanding one that has not sent an update since September and these people think this is acceptable.

I’ve taken part in around twenty projects on Kickstarter over the years. In most cases (about 18), my experience was really positive: the creators kept their promises and I received exactly what was advertised, sometimes even with nice extra surprises. It used to be a platform I genuinely liked for discovering new projects and supporting creators.

But two projects turned out to be, for me, outright scams. The creators took money from many backers without ever delivering what they had promised, and without offering any real explanation. In those situations, I felt that Kickstarter completely washed its hands of the problem: no concrete help, no real recourse, while backers are left as the only losers.

As a backer, I ultimately feel very poorly protected. Everything depends on the trust you place in strangers and a few lines of project description, which is very fragile. At this point, I would really like to see a platform that genuinely takes contributor safety seriously, with proper checks on creators and at least a minimum level of protection when things go wrong.
I've of course deleted my account !

Stay Clear of Kickstarter absolute scam. signed up and paid for a product. and ultimately lost all the money paid as the Kickstarter decided not to fulfil and customer service basically said tough luck. so buyers beware. there is no commitment for them to fulfil the order and no refunds if they don't

Centre for unfulfilled promises, absolutely no support for backers and mostly excuses and blame shifting. I have backed a few project in the spirit of early KS days, but few delivered, and contacting KS gets you nowhere except some generic emails about your risk and oh we can’t do anything ( except take money and commissions)
Sadly this company has ruined community support for both people and projects- from comments by many backers KS is nothing but bad experience - forget even discussing backer support. A pity

Kickstarter is upfront that the projects are the responsibility of the creator. They're quite upfront about it.

joke of a company should not be allowed to operate. I lost £200 and they will not help you try and get it back. They just mess you around asking for more information they don’t investigate or look at any of the backers so basically your just wasting your money. Should not be allowed to operate.

I funded $1,000 for a computer monitor project by a company called JGF from Hong Kong. A total of $135,000 was funded by others like me. The so-called developer has not responded to any email.

Norm updated their last post, which was six weeks ago, promising to begin shipping within one week of that post, which would have been the 30th of November. No one has yet received their computer monitor. Kickstarter is jacking all of us around. Lots of excuses. No assistance whatsoever.

Kickstarter is a scam. I will never, ever do business with them again. And others should be very wary of investing their money in their so-called projects.

Worst company ever! They support scammers on their platform!! After 5 times informing a maker is scamming customers with real proof, they don’t take any action! Never by anything at them!!!

I have backed multiple kickstarters that I have had to file a complaint against.. and KS isnt doing ****.
They are very anti backer and people should be very warey when backing a kickstarter.
Meanwhile they seem to have no issue with creators not abiding by the rules.

Kickstarter is a hotbed for scammers.

Kickstarter facilitate fraud. No projects delivered, project takes millions and disappears. Months later the EXACT SAME project is re listed and allowed to collect another 500k, to not be delivered.

My advice, never use kickstarter.

Like the majority of people advising Trust Pilot. Kickstarter should be renamed Scam starter & I took have had enough of the cavalier attitude of Kickstarter & the way it contemptuously deals with it's clients, especially with no checks or balances in place that should stop scammers in their tracks.
This has the result that it becomes inevitable that Kickstarter too must be part of the Scamming process.
No doubt, a few genuine creators become involved, thus fabricating a semi sort of normality to the whole Scam scenario.
But please be aware that Kickstarter as well as it's sister company Indiegogo are primarily full blown Scam company, as can be clearly evidenced by all the angry low ratings by others and should be avoided at all costs.

No wonder they have 1 star. Should be zero. Backed a project that took five years to end and still did not receive my order of crownes chess set.

Appalling behaviour and kickstarter are not liable at all. Rubish.

Not only does kickstarter not protect investors but also they do nothing against fraudulent companies who create campaigns over and over. I’ve lost a lot of money on a few campaigns and that’s really sad that I won’t be investing anymore through this website. Too bad they don’t do what’s right and what’s necessary to protect investors.