Why Millennials are going "chronically offline" and back to analog.
Millennials have a unique experience of growing up with an analog childhood and digital adolescence. Most Millennials have vivid recollections of Saturday morning cartoons and portable CD players. It was a time when people bought something once and owned it until it broke or became obsolete.
While the generation is known for its ease with technology and constant change, many are now ditching it. Instead of being chronically online, Millennials are choosing to go "chronically offline," trading the digital world for tangible experiences. One of the group's biggest complaints about technology is how expensive everything has become. Almost everything now requires a monthly subscription, with even basic photo and video storage costing extra.
For some Millennials, simply existing has become a subscription-based experience, and they've had enough. But excessive subscriptions for streaming services and digital storage aren't the only issue. When you purchase an album, movie, episode, or series in the digital world, you don't actually own it. The price of a digital movie isn't any lower than a physical DVD, but you can't take that digital copy with you if you cancel the streaming service or if the service loses the rights to the movie. The same isn't true when you purchase a DVD.
Retro vibes: Enjoying tunes on a vintage cassette player.Photo credit: Canva
These factors are enough to make some people question why they're holding on to the digital world so tightly. One Millennial declared 2026 the year the generation is turning back the clock. Bee, who goes by Feral House Wifey on TikTok, says in a video that subscriptions are out of control and that too many options overwhelm people, before adding that she was going back to DVDs.
"We're going back to having conversations in person in coffee shops, okay," she says. "We are going back to letting kids be wild in our yards, in our neighborhoods, running free, being outside, getting off video games. We're bringing potlucks back. In-person dinners and potlucks with friends. We're bringing back handwritten letters, sending cards, just thinking of you type of sh-t like our grandmothers and our mothers did. We are bringing this sh-t back because this sh-t can't die. It can't. We cannot let the digital age steal what it means to be human. We cannot let convenience take away our desire to connect."
Millennials aren't the only ones trying to return to the analog world; Gen Z and older Gen Alpha are also nostalgic for a time they never experienced.
In the comments under Bee's video, one mom shared that her daughter asked for a '90s mall experience for her birthday—and was thrilled with the results: "My daughter, for her 13th birthday, wanted a 'real 90s mall Christmas experience.' We drove an hour to the closest non-dead mall that was actually BUSTLING with people and decor and shopping. She had an absolute blast - couldn't thank us enough. And now my teen son wants to do that for his birthday. 😅 So here for this!"
Cozy reading nook on a chilly day.Photo credit: Canva
"So at some point, digital life all stopped being fun," YouTuber Boss From Home shares. "We somehow feel pressure to post just to remain relevant in today's society, and engaging with other human beings has now become some sort of dreadful obligation. Even scrolling started feeling like work, and that's because in a lot of ways, it is work. You're producing data, you're feeding the algorithms, and you're comparing your life to highlight reels while being told to stay motivated for your own work. So when people say, 'well, I'm going analog,' what they're really saying is, 'well, I'm done performing my life online just for people to see.'"
No matter the reason people are logging off, the common thread is that the digital world has become too expensive financially, emotionally, and socially. Instead of spending hours online, people are borrowing books from the library, spending physical time with family and friends, and listening to music on analog devices. The art of writing letters is also making a resurgence as people ditch ever-expanding technology for human connection. Millennials are taking control of the digital world by leaving it, and they aren't alone.