[2] Each Webkinz toy has an attached tag with a unique "secret code" printed on it, allowing its owner to play with a digital version of their pet on iOS, Android, and desktop computers.

Sales of Webkinz plush toys are limited to the United States and Canada, but international users can buy virtual pets from the Ganz eStore.

[4] Karl Borst, the creative director of Webkinz, had the idea to link the new plush toy line to an online site, and later to a virtual world.

After the site’s premiere in 2005, users could register the code on the tag of their plush toys, and play games with the virtual version of their adopted Webkinz pet.

The original site had among its features a few games in the arcade section, the “W-Shop” where users could use their in-game points for virtual items, and the ability to customize the pets’ rooms, but many more interactive features have been added to Webkinz World since, including a school (called the “Kinzville Academy”) where users can play minigames which improve their pets’ abilities, and a trivia section where users can earn points for answering questions.

In 2015, a decade after the site’s launch, Ganz introduced a major update to the game (called Webkinz X), which had been failing due to certain technical errors in the coding.

Webkinz X improved many of these problems, but also created many more, as the unique mixture of new code and code as old as 2005 resulted in several hundred in-game objects disappearing, or otherwise not functioning properly; the animation joints of some Webkinz avatars also were affected, often resulting in an awkward and disjointed appearance.

Lil’ Kinz unlock the same virtual items as a regular-size Webkinz, but feature a smaller in-game avatar.

Similarly, one Zodiac Pet was released every month, and were limited to just digital avatars, with no plush being made available; however, there was greater variety in the types of animals offered, not comprising only dogs as before, but including an Eagle, a snake, a horse, a crab, and even a butterfly in the series.

The user can earn money (called KinzCash) by adopting new pets, playing online games, answering general knowledge questions, and through daily activities like spinning the Wheel of WOW, playing Wishing Well 2, or completing jobs (minigames) available once every 8 hours.