Children all over the world love LEGO®, but what happens when those children outgrow their brick-building days? What happens to the hundreds of loose bricks that are just taking up space in your home?

Today, it’s drilled into us to reuse and recycle wherever we can, so it feels wrong to throw something away that’s perfectly usable. If the time has come to dispose of your old LEGO®, you’re probably wondering how best to shift your bricks. Can LEGO® can be recycled and if so, how do you recycle them?

Well, unfortunately, LEGO® is almost impossible to recycle in the traditional sense. Recycling is the process of collecting and processing materials that would otherwise be thrown away and turning them into new products. The plastic that LEGO® is made out of is very difficult to melt down to turn into something else, so if you try to recycle your bricks, they’re likely to end up in landfill.

But don’t give up hope just yet! There are other ways to dispose of, or ‘recycle’ your LEGO® that are environmentally friendly.

Why is LEGO® not recyclable?

LEGO® is famous for being sturdy and durable. While these are great qualities for a toy to have, they’re not so great when it comes to recycling.

Lego is made up of 20 different types of plastic, 80% being ABS (acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene). ABS is what gives LEGO® its strength and is generally very difficult to recycle. So although it is possible to recycle LEGO®, most recycling centres don’t accept it.

LEGO® is working on finding a more sustainable material for their bricks, that will enable them to be recycled. But for now, we’re tasked with finding other ways to give our unwanted LEGO® a second purpose and avoid waste.

What can I do with my old LEGO® UK?

1. Sell your LEGO®

Selling old LEGO® is a great way to expand it’s life. Not only will you be giving your bricks a new home, but you’ll get paid for it too!

The best place to sell unwanted Lego online is on WeBuyBricks. We aim to give people a sustainable solution when they’re decluttering LEGO® bricks, that’s completely hassle-free! We buy LEGO® by weight, so there’s no need to organise your collection before you sell it. Whether you have co-ordinated sets or a jumbled up bag of bricks, we’ll take them off your hands in exchange for cash.