‘Algorithms make everything predictable’: why the CD is making a comeback

As John Lewis reports a 96% rise in searches for CD players, music fans share their reasons for ditching streaming

CDs appear to be having a resurgence. John Lewis said searches for CD players are up 96% since July, while another report on trends in music and film this year found that CD sales are up 16%.

With this in mind, we asked music fans why they favour discs over other formats, and if it is a new preference or a lifetime habit.

Andrew Wales, 67, from London, owns “well over 10,000” CDs. “My wife’s very considerate,” he says over the phone. “There’s quite a few in this room where I’m speaking.” They have also spilt into the next bedroom and into the corridor.

“I don’t need Spotify,” says Wales. “The fact is, I like listening to music and I have always preferred owning it in a physical form. The [size of the] CD format allows me to own the number I own despite living in a two-bedroom flat and not a country mansion, so that’s another bonus.”

Much of the classical music Wales buys and listens to is available only on CD. “I bought my first CD in 1991 – John Scofield, Meant to Be – around the same time that I bought my first CD player. LPs were becoming increasingly shoddy, both in terms of pressing and presentation, and their limitations meant that often or not songs or tracks were included on the CD release, but not on LP. There are still cases where that happens today.”

That said, Wales also owns “about 2,000 LPs”, “a few hundred cassettes” and an increasing number of Blu-rays. “I’m not always wedded to a single format.”

Unlike Wales, Gabriela Crowley, 32, from San Jose, California, started listening to CDs only over the last year. “Growing up, my parents had a tonne of them,” she says. “My dad played them in the car and everywhere. And then he got an iPod. By the time I was like 18, everything had started to shift away from physical media.”

Her return to physical records started with the vinyl trend a few years ago. “I met my husband, who also had a large record collection, and we enjoyed that hobby together for a while. But after having a baby, we found we really weren’t listening to our records much any more – they were too bulky and inconvenient. My father-in-law gave us one of his old CD players and now we use that every day.”

A CD collection helps with the “paradox of choice” that streaming brings, she says. “Instead of being paralysed by the endless options, you become more intimately familiar with what you have. I find it a much more satisfying way to engage with music. Plus, no autoplay or AI-generated playlists are being forced on me.”

“I bought my first CD in 1988 and have been collecting ever since,” says Neil Cumming, 53, from Gloucester. “I have several hundred of them. Everything from classical, folk, rock, blues …”

Cumming buys CDs mostly to support musicians. “I like a lot of small indie and folk bands, who are not making a lot of money. I buy CDs directly from them when I can, which means they get a bigger share of my money than they would if I streamed their music.

“And it means I own the CD for ever,” he says. “Streaming means you are basically renting the music, and it can disappear from the streaming sites. I enjoy the ritual of selecting a CD and putting it in the machine – it is a nicer experience than just pressing play on an app.”

Not that he’s anti-streaming. “It’s quite good for trying music before you buy CDs or finding new acts. But in the evening, with a mug of tea or a glass of whisky, I find the experience of a CD more satisfying.”

“I am drawn to the narrative and aesthetic arc of an album,” says Asha Varadharajan, 65, from Toronto. “It’s the antithesis of scrolling. I’ve never been a fan of music as white noise in the background, unless I’m boogying while vacuuming.”

Varadharajan has owned her CD player since 1999, “which allows me to listen to five CDs at a time in any order I choose, building my own narrative arc as I listen.

“I’m grateful to friends who introduced me to artists I may never have listened to,” she says. “The patience and persistence required in listening to a CD makes songs memorable. Streaming makes music ephemeral. I think algorithms make everything predictable, but everybody’s taste is kind of random.”

It helps that CDs are hard to damage, she says. “I’m a klutz and was terrified of scratching albums as a child because I never could place the needle accurately without my hand shaking.”

Ed, 63, from London, bought his first CDs in 1986 – “Genesis, Invisible Touch, and Level 42, World Machine, if you must know” – and has “never stopped”, he says. “But my interest in the format has waxed and waned.

“When they first came out, CDs were very much positioned as: they’ll last for ever, you can drill holes in them, you can put jam on them and they still play. But I got put off CDs because they sounded too bright and shiny compared to vinyl.”

But over the past two years, Ed has bought more CDs owing to their “almost throwaway prices against the excessive costs of vinyl”. Having music on CD “gives me something tactile and tangible”, Ed says. “A good digital source is now every bit as engaging as a good record player.”