Predicting the fickle art market is difficult at the best of times – and 2025 had its fair share of struggles. There was the USD 70 million Giacometti flop at Sotheby’s in May and a steady stream of gallery closures around the world, though some openings too. But the year ended strongly with USD 2.2 billion-worth of art sold in the November marquee auctions in New York and buzzy, successful fairs in London, Paris, and Miami. After 3 years of contraction, there is a distinct sense a corner has been turned, but this is a market in transition with a new wave of collectors coming through the ranks. So, what can we expect in 2026?

Here are six trends to look out for:

Experiences over things

Auction houses may have bet big on handbags and classic cars over the past few years – and recent results for Sotheby’s in Abu Dhabi looked promising – but research by the US management consultancy firm Bain suggests that a ‘tectonic shift’ is afoot in the luxury market with buyers increasingly choosing experiences over new things, a matter of ‘experiential indulge’ over the ‘conspicuous consumption’ that was the hallmark of the boom years. The well-off will continue to spend on luxury travel in particular, according to another consultancy firm McKinsey, which estimates that global spending on luxury hospitality will exceed USD 390 billion in 2028, up from USD 239 billion in 2023. With first-class flights and sales of private jets also on the rise, live events in the art world are likely to benefit from this growing demand for exclusive experiences abroad. More art viewing in transit, then, in 2026.

Digital art is here to stay

‘Digital art is no longer at the margins – it is integral to how art and the market are evolving in real time,’ said Art Basel’s CEO Noah Horowitz at the launch of Zero 10 at Art Basel Miami Beach in December. Reported sales were brisk at the new section of the fair dedicated to digital and new media art, where Beeple’s installation of robotic dogs excreting NFTs sold out within 5 hours. For decades, tech investors have been the elusive unicorns the art market has been chasing, and Zero 10 is already attracting a new class of buyer, but traditional art collectors are branching out too. According to the latest Art Basel and UBS Survey of Global Collecting, digital art now ranks third after painting and sculpture in terms of total spending, with 51% of the high-net-worth respondents purchasing a digital artwork in 2024 or 2025. Expect more momentum in 2026 with the roll out of Zero 10 across Art Basel’s Hong Kong and Swiss editions in March and June, respectively.

Bottom quintile (USD 500–50,000) will continue to expand

In part thanks to those all-important single-owner sales, trophy lots made a comeback at the end of 2025. As many as 40 works sold over the USD 10 million mark in the marquee November auctions in New York, while the most expensive work sold publicly at Art Basel Miami Beach in December was a USD 18 million Warhol. But it is the bottom quintile (works below USD 50,000) that continues to show the greatest strength. According to research by the art market newsletter Puck, the bottom segment in the New York auctions had the highest hammer ratio, of 1.57, meaning that the achieved hammer prices were, on average, 1.57 times (or 157%) the estimated values. It is a pattern borne out by the latest Art Basel and UBS Art Market Report, which found that, while the overall value of the art market fell in 2024, transaction volumes rose and lower-priced segments performed relatively better. With the younger generation’s tastes becoming increasingly eclectic, and auction houses and art fairs diversifying their offerings with everything from digital art to dinosaurs, it is a safe bet that this segment of the market will continue to expand in 2026.

Middle East growth

The art market is always on the lookout for the next big thing and all eyes will be on the Gulf this year when both Art Basel and Frieze launch their fairs in Qatar in February and Abu Dhabi in November, respectively. Dubai has an established reputation as an art market hub, with its fair, Art Dubai, now entering its 20th year, but the market power of other Gulf states is less tried and tested. There is significant momentum behind Abu Dhabi, where long-standing partnerships with international museums and strategic investments, including ADQ’s USD 1 billion investment in Sotheby’s in 2024, have paved the way for what some commentators are describing as a new crossroads in the global art market. Qatar’s cultural footprint continues to expand, meanwhile, with the launch of a new quadrennial in November 2026, but the nation’s domestic market has to date largely been sustained by its royal art collection. And let us not forget that there was a flurry of interest in the Middle East in the early 2000s; the road ahead for establishing new market hubs in the region will be long.

Private sales will grow to rival auctions

Competition between auction houses and dealers has always been a major point of contention in the art world, and that rivalry is set to heat up in 2026 with galleries, advisors, and platforms that excel in private-sale placement predicted to gain market share. In June, several former auction house executives who have been instrumental in some of the art world’s biggest deals over the past 30 years, including Edward Dolman and Brett Gorvy, joined forces to create New Perspectives Art Partners, which aims to advise top-level clients in all aspects of buying and selling art. Another ‘supergroup’, Pace Di Donna Schrader Galleries (PDS), is due to start trading in early 2026. PDS, which will specialize in secondary market sales, is a partnership between Pace Gallery, led by chief executive Marc Glimcher, the dealer Emmanuel Di Donna, and David Schrader, formerly head of private sales at Sotheby’s. Not to be outdone, auction houses are also betting on private sales, which offer sellers full control on price and security against the work failing to sell, and now account for 20% of all revenue, up from 12% a decade ago.

More single-owner collections

Single-owner collections came to the rescue of the auction houses at the end of 2025. Of the USD 2.23 billion raised at Christie’s, Sotheby’s, and Phillips in the November New York marquee auctions, single-owner collection sales generated USD 962 million, up 132% year-on-year and represented 43% of total revenue, according to data compiled by Pi-eX. Sotheby’s – which presented three major collections: those of Leonard A. Lauder, Cindy and Jay Pritzker, and the ‘Exquisite Corpus’ collection of Surrealist art – recorded the strongest revenue expansion (+120%) compared to Christie’s and Phillips (+40% and +16% respectively). So, can we expect more in 2026? An educated guess would say yes. While consignments have yet to be announced, auction houses will be chasing future single-owner collections, which not only provide essential support to auction turnover but also create marketing opportunities that can help secure further business. But, while these additional sales inject momentum into the market, there is some evidence to suggest that their expanding role relative to repeating sales, which are in decline, may be to the detriment of trade activity elsewhere.

We may be entering 2026 on a relative high, but this serves as a reminder that it is still too early to announce a clean bill of health.

Anny Shaw is a UK-based writer, editor and speaker. She is a contributing art market editor at The Art Newspaper, critic for the London Standard and commissioning editor for Art Basel Stories. Anny has been a regular guest on The Week in Art podcast and has written for publications including the Financial Times, The Times, the Guardian, The World of Interiors, and Apollo.

Caption for header image: View of Galeria greengrassi's booth at Art Basel Basel 2025. 

Published on January 6, 2026.