’90s tech – From VHS tapes that turn movies into a ritual to WiFi-enabled landline replicas, ‘90s technology is coming back as younger consumers push back against constant digital distraction. The resurgence is showing up in household choices and in the comeback of physic
In many homes, the switch to “always on” devices didn’t just change how people watched movies or listened to music. It changed the rhythm of daily life—notifications, scrolling, and the sense that someone, somewhere, expects a reply.
For some younger consumers, the solution isn’t more screen time. It’s less. Gen Z and millennials are leaning into analog tech from the 1990s—flip phones. digital cameras. landlines—and companies are retooling the idea for the present. Tin Can. for example. resembles a landline but runs off a home’s WiFi. offering a familiar form without the same level of modern dependence.
One parent, Alison Bennett, previously said, “I want my daughter to be able to chat with her friends, like I did as a child in the ’90s,” especially as she sought to delay giving her 8-year-old a smartphone.
That desire for tactile, intentional entertainment is showing up across categories—sometimes in old products coming back, sometimes in modern recreations. Even hacky sack is back, and some of the shift is rooted in a preference for activities that don’t revolve around a feed.
VHS tapes have become a symbol of that change. After launching in the late 1970s. VHS overtook Sony’s Betamax to become the dominant way people watched movies at home in the 1980s and 1990s. Video rental stores such as Blockbuster, Hollywood Video, and smaller independent shops turned movie nights into social outings. Blockbuster reached its peak in 2004, when it operated more than 9,000 stores worldwide.
VHS also reshaped television habits by letting viewers record shows and movies for later—years before streaming made on-demand viewing possible. with a “side of decision fatigue.” But by the late 1990s. DVDs began replacing VHS due to their slim size and higher quality. In 2003, DVD rentals overtook VHS rentals in the US for the first time, as The Washington Post reported. Sony stopped producing Betamax in 2015. The following year, the final VHS VCR was produced, with The Guardian citing low sales numbers.
Still, VHS never fully disappeared. A 2025 Consumer Reports report said about 15% of Americans reported watching VHS tapes in the year prior. The report attributed the renewed interest to Gen Z and millennials increasingly seeking physical media and analog experiences.
Portable CD players are seeing a similar swing. After CDs were developed by Philips and Sony and released to the public in 1982. they were more durable than cassettes and records and could hold around 80 minutes of music. the BBC reported. Two years later, Sony’s Discman was released, giving people a way to listen to high-quality music on the go. Discman became a fixture in the late ’80s and peaked in the late 1990s and early 2000s. when CDs were the preferred music format. By 1999, Sony had sold 46 million Discmen worldwide, the company said.
The devices came with unmistakable accessories—thick binders of burned CDs, Discman belt cases, and tangled headphones. They fell out of favor in the early 2000s as the iPod, released in 2001, rose. Those players could store thousands of songs without a bulky binder. The possible comeback is now being discussed again: The Guardian reported in 2025 that CDs and CD players had regained popularity as Gen Z and millennials embraced ’90s nostalgia and collectors sought deluxe physical releases from artists including Taylor Swift and Pink Floyd. The 2025 Consumer Reports report said 45% of Americans had used CDs to listen to music in the previous year.
Not every comeback is about museum-like nostalgia. Some are about social habits and the way tech forces people to interact in the same physical space.
Nintendo’s Game Boy. released in 1989. became a defining handheld gaming product of the 1990s. especially with hit games such as “Tetris” and “Pokémon Red and Blue” placed into the device’s cartridge slot. Later iterations brought different exterior colors. mini versions. and the Game Boy Color released in 1998. featuring a color screen rather than the original’s monochrome one. When the Game Boy celebrated its 30th birthday in 2019. Nintendo had sold more than 118 million Game Boy and Game Boy Color consoles worldwide. and more than 500 million games. per Nintendo data.
Even as handheld gaming evolved through the early 2000s—eventually smartphones changed habits—Nintendo has tried to capitalize on ’90s nostalgia by re-releasing Game Boy games for its newer devices.
For others, the draw is built into the hardware itself. The Nintendo 64. released in 1996. became one of the defining consoles of the late 1990s thanks to smoother 3D gaming and iconic titles like “Super Mario 64” and “The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time.” It also supported four controllers right out of the box. enabling multiplayer modes and making sleepovers into competition zones. Its popularity declined in the early 2000s after newer systems such as the PlayStation 2 and Xbox offered more advanced graphics and larger disc-based storage. Today. retro gamers collect original cartridges and hardware. while younger players are turning to the old tech amid “AI anxiety” and the novelty of needing to be together to play multiplayer.
Tamagotchis and virtual pets carried a different kind of lesson—one that echoes what many people now want from their devices. Bandai’s Tamagotchi launched in Japan in 1996, the Associated Press reported. Owners were required to constantly feed. clean. and care for the egg-shaped virtual pets to ensure they reached adulthood. which typically took a few days. Competing models such as Nano Pets and Giga Pets followed. but schools deemed the pets so distracting that some banned them. The New York Times reported in 1997.
Tamagotchi expanded into mobile gaming in 2013 with an app designed to recreate the original toy experience, AP reported. The franchise was inducted into the World Video Game Hall of Fame in 2025. Tamagotchis are still available today. In a 2020 Business Insider article. an adult user wrote that caring for a Tamagotchi during the COVID-19 pandemic helped improve her productivity. happiness. and sleep schedule.
Even when the technology changed, the underlying impulse stayed the same. Tamagotchis also foreshadowed today’s digital and cellphone habits: kids and teenagers constantly checked alerts and responded to the toys’ virtual needs—a connection explored in a 2024 article from The Walrus.
Walkie-talkies, meanwhile, return people to direct communication. The first portable two-way radios were developed for the US military in the 1930s and 1940s before becoming commercially available to the public. Smithsonian Magazine reported. These walkie-talkies were beloved in the 1980s and 1990s for backyard games, road trips, and camping trips. Unlike telephones, walkie-talkies let users speak immediately without dialing numbers or relying on phone lines. They were also easy for kids to use—no treehouse was complete without the distinctive crackle of a walkie-talkie.
Cellphones usurped walkie-talkies in many households in the 2000s, but they remain useful today, especially in areas without cell service. They’re used for outdoor activities, music festivals, and emergency preparedness.
Disposable cameras add another kind of friction—one that changes the psychology of taking photos. After launching in the 1980s. disposable cameras—cheap. light. and easy to use—became a staple of the 1990s. showing up on family vacations and at teenage parties. Their popularity waned in the 2000s as digital cameras and then smartphones shifted users toward instant photography. Vox reported that digital-camera sales began to outpace film-camera sales in the early 2000s. and that Kodak failed to adapt before filing for bankruptcy in 2012.
The analog shift isn’t one-directional. Digital cameras regained popularity in recent years. In 2024, NPR reported that digital cameras from the early 2000s became popular among Gen Zers seeking the nostalgic aesthetic of Y2K photos.
Even the “beep” of pagers has an afterlife in parts of the economy that prize reliability. Before texting and smartphones, pagers—beepers—were among the fastest ways to stay connected. During the 1980s and 1990s, doctors, emergency workers, business professionals, and teenagers relied on pocket-sized devices. They used pager codes that sent quick messages via numbers before text messaging made it possible. including “143. ” which meant “I love you” because the words contain one. four. and three letters.
Pager popularity declined with cell phones, but they never disappeared entirely. CBS News and Reuters reported that some hospitals and emergency services still use them because pager networks can remain reliable during disasters and service outages.
Landlines, of course, are the original offline ritual. Despite their quirks—being tethered to a wall. potentially spied on by your family. and picking up before knowing who was calling—landlines ruled communication for much of the 20th century. By the 1990s, cordless phones and caller ID became common in American homes. But in the 2000s, as mobile phones became cheaper and more practical, landline dominance faded.
The turning point can be measured. According to the CDC’s 2024 National Health Interview Survey. nearly 79% of US adults live in wireless-only households—meaning many have abandoned landlines for mobile phones. Still, some people are returning to them or at least romanticizing them. Many Gen Zers and millennials are pushing back against constant connectivity by “bricking” their cell phones—blocking some apps and websites—and spending more time on offline hobbies instead. The landline advantage. as one idea in the reporting puts it. is that if you weren’t home. you couldn’t be reached.
That’s the thread connecting the tape rewind. the unplugged weekend. and the choice to pick up something that doesn’t buzz. When technology gives people endless options and constant signals, it can be exhausting. And when it forces a moment—whether it’s a VHS rental you commit to. a four-controller multiplayer night on the Nintendo 64. or a landline you can’t reach unless you’re there—the experience can feel simpler. steadier. and more human.
Even the devices that faded—Betamax and the VHS VCR, the Discman and the iPod-era convenience, walkie-talkies overtaken by phones—are being reintroduced through the same lens: not just nostalgia, but a desire for control over attention in a world that never stops asking for it.
VHS tapes landlines Tin Can analog technology Gen Z nostalgia digital fatigue Consumer Reports 2025 Blockbuster Discman CD players Game Boy Nintendo 64 Tamagotchi walkie-talkies disposable cameras pagers beepers CDC National Health Interview Survey 2024