"Lego" bricks on Ali Express

[Doza]

I know they are not going to be as good as the real thing but DS has had his heart set on a discontinued lego star wars set for a year now! Its €300 or more on Amazon, so that's not going to happen; I can get a mock lego one for a fraction of the price. Has anyone experience of Lepin bricks from AliExpress?

I’d be interested to know if they come with building instructions too as I want a Hogwarts castle set since they don’t make them anymore 😭

I ordered some, I was worried it wouldn’t arrive or that it would get confiscated by customs but it was dispatched quickly and arrived in just over a week - I could track its progress via Singapore and Germany! It was in a plain cardboard box which protected it ok and inside were hundreds of clear bags filled with squillions of bricks, I think it will take about a month to make! It comes with a really clear instruction booklet, just like the Lego sets, plus the figures.
I personally can’t see any difference between it and genuine Lego apart from the lack of nice box although ours hasn’t been constructed yet.

Thanks ohanabanana its good to hear there are instructions and they look ok: was yours Lepin? Dont tell me there's a Hogwarts or I may have to get it for DD

Hi yes it was Lepin and I’m pretty sure there was a Hogwarts 😀

We've had a few small sets and they've been fine. Much better than Wilkinson own brand which are rubbish!

Lepin has a huge following in fact theres an entire reddit forum dedicated to it and they seem to love it www.reddit.com/r/lepin. I brought some of the Batman Movie characters and they're excellent the pieces click together really well.

Funny how the quality of the fakes improved so much once Lego started production in China.

I want the ghostbusters firehouse but hogwarts sounds very interesting.

I was tempted by the ghostbusters firehouse - it’s still quite expensive though but I’m sure much cheaper than actual Lego. I’d also love a Disney castle set for myself but it’s $125 and I don’t honestly know where I’d put it once it was built!

Does keeping bag the pieces the way lego does (ie bag 1 is the first pieces to put together etc)? Our fake Legos all seem randomly bagged so far. DS just doesn’t bother looking for the pieces if there are too many

My son bought a £15 ali express version of some Star Wars lego that retails for much more. He was v happy with, instructions are absolutely fine - just like originals. Some of the mini figures fit together slightly differently - can't quite remember what it was, think it was that the hands were separate from the arms. He said one or two of the bricks were hard to click together but not a major problem, just a bit stiffer than normal.

The tiny bricks called nanobricks which i think you can get on aliexpress and amazon are woŕth getting

Are they compatible with lego?

Thanks for the feedback: I ordered today!
It was the Bright Tree Village set he has been obsessing over, but I ended up ordering the Hogwarts Express for DD as well. I'll report back if it arrives, the build quality will have to wait until after Christmas though!

Can I ask those who have had sets, have I interpreted it correctly that they don't come in a printed box, just bags and a leaflet? If so, that's a bit of a dubious gift?

@ Alabasterangel6 I've never ordered Lepin, I much prefer Lego as I know it's passed safety tests.

However if you order from Aliexpress it tells you on the sets if it comes with a box, be warned most Lepin sets don't come with boxes. Just click on the set and scroll down to the product details. If there's no box it will say
Package: No original box

Arrived today!!
Looks good, full instructions with the sets, build will have to wait until after Christmas Day.
Neither of the sets were boxed, but that was clear at the time of ordering.
I have said to DS on many, many, many occasions that the set has been discontinued so it is very unlikely he'll get it, I'll use this to pass the lack of an offical box off as Santa finding one of the last few sets etc and package it in a Christmas box: he REALLY won't care once he sees it
I will report once its built, may be in February sometime though, it's HUGE!

My partner swears by the Chinese replicas and he's the fussiest person ever. It's so similar that you wouldn't know the difference, even the instructions look the same.

The main problem is that as it's half the price they want to buy twice as much!

And as Doza says, you can get the most popular discontinued sets too. The genuine lego ones cost £1000s even on eBay!

It's really good quality and the instructions are easy to follow. The only downside (if you're giving it as a gift) is that it comes in a plain box, so doesn't look too fancy.

My brother is a lego collector but as bought some of the lego from China for some items he wanted to build not keep. Massive savings to be made and he said the only difference he can see/feel is that there is no lego logo stamped on it and he has been collecting lego for 30 years. I am very tempted as the likes of the death star then become possibly justifiable

Exactly. Hubby has bought a couple of the discontinued UCS sets.

They're going on ebay for up to £5000, he paid about £150 :)

There's a couple of uk sites selling it now. Slightly more expensive than going direct to manufacturers but still a bargain and you don't have to do the legwork.

ooh I didn't know these existed!!!

Any chance you can like to the UK sites please Birdie.

would also be keen for a link to a UK site if it was handy? @Birdie81