Whether you reckon they are cute, ugly or just plain weird, chances are you have heard of the furry dolls that have become a global sensation – Labubu.

Born a monster, the elf-like creature from Chinese toy maker Pop Mart is now a viral purchase. And it has no dearth of celebrity advocates: Rihanna, Dua Lipa, Kim Kardashian and Blackpink’s Lisa. Ordinary folk are just as obsessed – from Shanghai to London, the long queues to snap up the doll have made headlines, sometimes descending into fights even.

“You get such a sense of achievement when you are able to get it among such fierce competition,” says avowed fan Fiona Zhang.

The world’s fascination with Labubu has almost tripled Pop Mart’s profits in the past year – and, according to some, even energised Chinese soft power, which has been bruised by the pandemic and a strained relationship with the West.

So, how did we get here?

It’s a question that still bothers many – and even those who know the answer are not entirely sure they can explain the craze.

Labubu is both a fictional character and a brand. The word itself doesn’t mean anything. It’s the name of a character in “The Monsters” toy series created by Hong Kong-born artist Kasing Lung.

The vinyl faces are attached to plush bodies, and come with a signature look – pointy ears, big eyes and a mischievous grin showing exactly nine teeth. A curious yet divided internet can’t seem to decide if they are adorable or bizarre.

According to its retailer’s official website, Labubu is “kind-hearted and always wants to help, but often accidentally achieves the opposite”.

The Labubu dolls have appeared in several series of “The Monsters”, such as “Big into Energy”, “Have a Seat”, “Exciting Macaron” and “Fall in Wild”.

The Labubu brand also has other characters from its universe, which have inspired their own popular dolls – such as the tribe’s leader Zimomo, her boyfriend Tycoco and her friend Mokoko.

To the untrained eye, some of these dolls are hard to distinguish from one another. The connoisseurs would know but Labubu’s fame has certainly rubbed off, with other specimens in the family also flying off the shelves.

A major part of Pop Mart’s sales were so-called blind boxes – where customers only found out what they had bought when they opened the package – for some years when they tied up with Kasing Lung for the rights to Labubu.

That was 2019, nearly a decade after entrepreneur Wang Ning opened Pop Mart as a variety store, similar to a pound shop, in Beijing. When the blind boxes became a success, Pop Mart launched the first series in 2016, selling Molly dolls – child-like figurines created by Hong Kong artist Kenny Wong.

But it was the Labubu sales that fuelled Pop Mart’s growth and in December 2020, it began selling shares on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. Those shares have soared by more than 500% in the last year.

Pop Mart itself has now become a major retailer. It operates more than 2,000 vending machines, or “roboshops”, around the world. And you can now buy Labubu dolls in stores, physical or virtual, in more than 30 countries, from the US and UK to Australia and Singapore, although many of them have recently paused sales due to overwhelming demand. Sales from outside mainland China contributed to nearly 40% of its total revenue in 2024.

In a sign of just how popular Labubus have become, Chinese customs officials said this week that they had seized more than 70,000 fake dolls in recent days.

The demand did not rise overnight though. It actually took a few years for the elfin monsters to break into the mainstream.

Before the world discovered Labubu, their fame was limited to China. They started to become a hit just as the country emerged from the pandemic in late 2022, according to Ashley Dudarenok, founder of China-focused research firm ChoZan.

“Post-pandemic, a lot of people in China felt that they wanted to emotionally escape… and Labubu was a very charming but chaotic character,” she says. “It embodied that anti-perfectionism.”

The Chinese internet, which is huge and competitive, produces plenty of viral trends that don’t go global. But this one did and its popularity quickly spread to neighbouring South East Asia.

Fiona, who lives in Canada, says she first heard about Labubu from Filipino friends in 2023. That’s when she started buying them – she says she finds them cute, but their increasing popularity is a major draw: “The more popular it gets the more I want it.

“My husband doesn’t understand why me, someone in their 30s, would be so fixated on something like this, like caring about which colour to get.”

It helps that it’s also affordable, she adds. Although surging demand has pushed up prices on the second-hand market, Fiona says the original price, which ranged from 25 Canadian dollars ($18; £14) to 70 Canadian dollars for most Labubu dolls, was “acceptable” to most people she knows.

“That’s pretty much how much a bag accessory would cost anyway these days, most people would be able to afford it,” she says.

Labubu’s popularity soared in April 2024, when Thai-born K-pop superstar Lisa began posting photos on Instagram with various Labubu dolls. And then, other global celebrities turned the dolls into an international phenomenon this year.

Singer Rihanna was photographed with a Labubu toy clipped to her Louis Vuitton bag in February. Influencer Kim Kardashian shared her collection of 10 Labubu dolls with her Instagram following in April. And in May, former England football captain Sir David Beckham also took to Instagram with a photo of a Labubu, given to him by his daughter.

Now the dolls feel ubiquitous, regularly spotted not just online but also on friends, colleagues or passers-by.

Put simply, we don’t know. Like most viral trends, Labubu’s appeal is hard to explain – the result of timing, taste and the randomness that is the internet.

Beijing is certainly happy with the outcome. State news agency Xinhua says Labubu “shows the appeal of Chinese creativity, quality and culture in a language the world can understand”, while giving everyone the chance to see “cool China”.

Xinhua has other examples that show “Chinese cultural IP is going global”: the video game Black Myth: Wukong and the hit animated film Nezha.

Some analysts seem surprised that Chinese companies – from EV makers and AI developers to retailers – are so successful despite Western unease over Beijing’s ambitions.

“BYD, DeepSeek, all of these companies have one very interesting thing in common, including Labubu,” Chris Pereira, founder and chief executive of consultancy firm iMpact, told BBC News.

“They’re so good that no one cares they’re from China. You can’t ignore them.”

Meanwhile, Labubu continue to rack up social media followers with millions watching new owners unbox their prized purchase. One of the most popular videos, posted in December, shows curious US airport security staff huddling around a traveller’s unopened Labubu box to figure out which doll is inside.

That element of surprise is a big part of the appeal, says Desmond Tan, a longtime collector, as he walks around a Pop Mart store in Singapore vigorously shaking blind boxes before deciding which one to buy. This is a common sight in Pop Mart.

Desmond collects “chaser” characters, special editions from Pop Mart’s various toy series, which include Labubu. On average, Desmond says, he finds a chaser in one out of every 10 boxes he buys. It’s a good strike rate, he claims, compared to the typical odds: one in 100.

“Being able to get the chaser from shaking the box, learning how to feel the difference…,” is deeply satisfying for him.

“If I can get it in just one or two tries, I’m very happy!”

Dissidents who have fled Alexander Lukashenko’s rule in Belarus have spoken of threats being made against them and their relatives at home.

Hundreds of thousands of Belarusians are estimated to have left their country since the brutal crackdown on widespread opposition protests in 2020, after Lukashenko, 70, claimed victory in presidential elections that were widely condemned as rigged.

Among the exiles was journalist Tatsiana Ashurkevich, 26, who continued to write about events in Belarus. Then, earlier this year, she discovered that the door of her flat in the capital, Minsk, had been sealed up with construction foam.

She guessed immediately who might be to blame. She decided to confront one of her followers on Instagram who had repeatedly messaged her with unsolicited compliments and views about the Belarusian opposition movement and journalism in exile.

“If there are criminal cases [against me], just say so,” she said. “I have nothing to do with that apartment – other people live there. Why are you doing this?”

The man immediately changed his tone to a more official one, saying criminal cases were not his responsibility, but he could ask the relevant department.

Then he made a request: could she, in exchange for help, share information about Belarusians fighting for Ukraine, especially since she had written about them before?

Ashurkevich blocked him.

In Belarus itself, tens of thousands of people have been arrested in the past five years for political reasons, according to human rights group Viasna.

But hundreds of critics of Lukashenko’s 31-year rule have also faced persecution abroad.

Lukashenko and Belarusian state media often accuse opposition activists of “betraying” the country and plotting a coup with assistance from the West. Authorities have justified targeting activists abroad, arguing they are trying to harm national security and overthrow the government.

Several people the BBC has spoken to have received messages and phone calls, sometimes seemingly innocuous, sometimes with thinly veiled threats – or promises with a catch.

Anna Krasulina, 55, receives them so often she has become used to putting her phone in flight mode before going to bed.

“I can see who’s handling me – it’s a couple of people. Or maybe it’s the same one using different accounts,” she says.

She’s convinced the authorities are behind this. Ms Krasulina works as a press secretary for Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, an opposition leader believed by many to have won the 2020 election, now living in exile.

Both women have been sentenced in Belarus to 11 and 15 years respectively in trials held in absentia. Charges included preparing a coup and running an extremist organisation.

Since such trials against exiled political opponents were made possible by a decree by Lukashenko in 2022, more than 200 cases have been opened, according to Viasna, with last year seeing a record number.

This allows authorities to raid the homes of the accused and harass their relatives.

Critics are being identified on photographs and videos made in opposition gatherings abroad.

Many have now stopped taking part in them, fearing for their loved ones who remain in Belarus, says Ms Krasulina.

Several people the BBC spoke to report their relatives being visited by the authorities.

“It’s terrifying when you can’t help them. You can’t go back. You can’t support them,” says one.

None would go on record or even reveal any details anonymously out of concern that their families could be hurt.

Their fears are not unfounded. Artem Lebedko, a 39-year old who worked in real estate, is serving a three-and-a-half year jail sentence for “financing extremism”.

He had never spoken out in public, but his father was an opposition politician living in exile.

Breaking the ties between Belarusians who have fled and those who stayed behind is a deliberate strategy by Lukashenko’s government, says journalist and analyst Hanna Liubakova, also sentenced in absentia to 10 years in prison.

“Even if someone in Belarus understands everything, they’ll think three times before talking to a ‘terrorist’,” she says, referring to a list of “extremists and terrorists” which the authorities populate with names of their critics.

The BBC sent a request for comment to the Belarusian Ministry of Internal Affairs, but had not received a response by the time of publication.

Some of Liubakova’s own relatives have also received visits from the security services, she says, and property registered in her name has been seized.

Everyone the BBC has spoken to believes the Belarusian authorities are seeking to exert maximum pressure on those who left in order to crush all opposition, wherever it is.

Hanna Liubakova believes the persecution of dissidents stems from Lukashenko’s personal revenge for the 2020 protests: “He wants us to feel unsafe even abroad, to know that we’re being watched.”

One country that has proved particularly unsafe for Belarusian exiles is Russia. According to authorities in Minsk, in 2022 alone Russia extradited 16 people accused of “extremist crimes”, a charge usually associated with Lukashenko critics.

“The methods used by Belarusian security forces are very similar to those of the Soviet KGB, just updated with modern technology, says Andrei Strizhak, head of Bysol, a group that supports Belarusian activists.

Threatening messages or promises of rewards for co-operation may not work on everyone, he adds. But by casting a wide net, the authorities may get a few who agree to share some useful information.

Strizhak calls the regime’s efforts to hunt dissidents abroad a “war of attrition” that leaves many activists exhausted and wishing to get on with their lives.

“We’re doing everything we can to stay resilient,” Strizhak says, “but every year, it takes more and more effort.”