A woman in my office has seen my yoyoing and wants to get one for her nephews. I was thinking if it can only be one yoyo, then an adjustable gap yoyo would probably be best rather than starting someone off with a pure unresponsive.
Also, it should probably be available on Amazon. I feel like she’d probably lose interest if I told her she had to come to a niche website like this. (no offense, YYE)
if you want an adjustable gap the only yoyo that has that really is the YYF velocity, otherwise you could buy a recess first base since it comes with a slim and wide bearing however having an extra bearing may not be a good idea since i’m assuming the kids would be on the younger side.
Yeah, I’m not sure how old they are. I’ll have to double check that before I give her my recommendation.
Recess First Base. Comes responsive, but with the extra bearing to make it unresponsive, and I think they are available on Amazon.
It depends on where their skill level is at. If they have literally never touched a yo-yo in their life, something like a Yomega brain might be really helpful just to get the basic mechanics of throwing and catching and throwing sleepers down.
Otherwise, the recess first base gets a lot of love.
Also available on YYE 
But yeah I’d recommend a yo-yo with two bearings rather than an adjustable gap
I only mentioned because he said it should be something available on Amazon
Just asked her… One is going into college next year and the other is a 9th grader so the dual-bearing thing shouldn’t be a problem
Yeah, for middle school and up the Recess First Base, YYF Arrow, Sage, or something along those lines is great.
Below a certain age (5 or so) I actually recommend fixed axle so they can’t take it apart and lose/eat the bearing. Duncan Butterfly or something similar in that case.
Just send her to a web site! There are so many just about any will get someone online and searching…?
yyf whip or velocity. love that high walled shape and light weight with lack of rim weight. will straighten out your throw n help with landing tricks with its narrowness.
I would steer clear of Duncan Imperial or Butterfly. Butterfly XT or YYF Oracle would be great. I went through this 3 years ago. To me, an Imperial is hard to tough to learn on but seasoned people can really work it. Butterfly XT is my starter recommendation. Cheap and if they get really interested jump to YYF Sage and/or Oracle but then you get into the whole buying extra pads thing. At least they have YOU so maybe you can meet with them and give them personal tips to clear up newbie frustrations. We all know what those are!
For an intro metal that comes with a responsive and unresponsive bearing a Topyo Creator would be good. For a responsive plastic that can become unresponsive a YYF Velocity would be great.
I agree completely, it’s a crazy deal at $14 for a very good metal yoyo + 2 bearings, however this is out of stock everywhere that I’ve looked, and has been for some time. I wanted to get one of these to mess around with and I had to order mine from Japan!
(Technically it is the TopYo Creater, no idea why they spelled it that way, but they did… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)
I strongly DO NOT recommend the Velocity because that whole “adjustable gap” thing invites people to get into trouble tweaking the gap of their yoyo. It ends up not being particularly good at either responsive or unresponsive as a result… 
Just start with a straight up dedicated responsive, if you turn out liking that, get a real unresponsive later, probably a decent metal one like Colossus or Silenus.
I do like the First Base, and it’s cool that it comes with both kinds of bearings, but it’s always felt a tad overpriced to me at $20 for some reason. Being able to get a metal TopYo Creater for $14 is an illustration of that… however, if you can get a First Base for $15 or less, definitely go for it!
I do think people should start out with a slim bearing / silicone pad responsive, which rules out the $5 Butterfly XT. Very inexpensive though!
I’m also not a fan of the Whip because it just doesn’t have the right shape to me.
… that leaves the YYF One at $9.99, which is not appreciably any cheaper than the MagicYoyo K1 (unless buying in bulk) … so I’m going with that!
You know, I just couldn’t get into the Butterfly XT. Mine felt super rickety and I couldn’t do any actual tricks with it. Other than a sleeper.
I just don’t understand the hype of it. Although, there is a chance that I got a dud.
Mine can do a little bit more. It has less response than some other responsive yoyos I’ve tried.
Do you have other metal fixed axles to compare to? I’m kind of super anti fixed axle in any material, to be honest, so I’m not a good person to ask about this.
But a butterfly XT has a size c bearing… It is recessed so deep that it has a thin, responsive gap though.
Oh my bad, you’re totally right. It is bearing and starburst response. I still get to rule it out because no silicone response! Did you try different strings?
Nope, I just played the stock string until it fizzled out. My son found joy in dissecting it, though.