Why Analog Hobbies Still Need a Digital Home

As a millennial, I’ve watched as younger generations have swooned over the “vintage” artifacts and analog hobbies from my childhood that were lost to digital progress. Before digital cameras filled Facebook albums, we had disposable cameras at parties and printed photo albums at home. We burned CDs until iPods made carrying 15 songs at a time feel primitive. We printed directions before leaving the house until our phones eventually started telling us where to turn.

Now my feeds are filled with landlines for smartphones, screen-free digital cameras, DIY pottery kits, and crochet gift boxes. Photographers are paying for the privilege of not knowing whether their pictures came out. People are spending weeks knitting something they can order finished by Friday. Somewhere out there a beginner pottery student is spending the afternoon producing a bowl with the structural integrity of a tortilla chip.

Nobody is asking for MapQuest printouts to make a comeback. Still, people are going analog and choosing products and experiences that deliberately restore what technology spent decades removing: waiting, uncertainty, repetition, mess, and the possibility of getting something wrong.

There’s just one problem with calling all this a “digital detox.” The internet is heavily involved.

Why are analog hobbies taking off?

Analog hobbies are screen-free activities like knitting, film photography, and pottery. YPulse reports that the trend is largely driven by digital burnout and a desire to spend time more intentionally, and 75% of 18- to 24-year-olds it surveyed say they want to go more analog.

In Pinterest’s 2026 Hobbies Trend Report, 51% of Gen Z respondents said having a hobby contributes to their joy. On the platform, searches for hand embroidery art rose 1,351%, easy air dry clay crafts rose 624%, and nature film photography rose 210%.

In its own 2026 Creativity Trend Report, Michaels showed that searches for analog hobbies like knitting, crocheting, embroidery, journaling, and painting rose 136% over six months. Guided craft kit sales climbed 86% year over year, and searches for craft nights rose 103%. Market research by Mintel similarly revealed that 73% of U.S. adults participated in a crafting project in 2026.

Music is part of the same shift. Young people are taking up instruments like the harp and violin, where progress comes steadily and requires the kind of sustained attention that a phone is very good at interrupting.

Almost none of these hobbies is efficient, which seems to be part of the draw. As technology has made nearly everything we do faster and easier, people are choosing to keep some things slow.

We got convenience, then we started missing effort

Efficiency helps when the goal is to finish the task, but some things lose their appeal when you rush through them. For example, a roll of film is a terrible piece of technology if your only goal is to produce a technically correct photograph as quickly as possible. A phone can take the picture, brighten it, crop it, straighten it, remove the stranger in the background, and show you the result right away. With film, you press the shutter and live with your decision. Maybe you caught something beautiful or maybe you photographed your thumb. You’ll find out later.

Younger generations are embracing it. Online searches for analog photography were up 41% in 2024. The following year, 35% of the 42 million active film camera users worldwide were reported to be between the ages of 18 and 30. The challenge of finding the right exposure or shutter speed, the suspense of not knowing what you created, or the ability to just hold it in your hands, is welcome when everything else comes instantly.

Pottery has its own version of this. Clay doesn’t care that you’re normally competent at things. Your first bowl may collapse. Your second may wobble. You can’t command-Z your way out of putting too much pressure on one side. But craft classes are filling up as people scale back their screen time. Global spending at pottery studios reached $1.8 billion in 2025, with workshops holding 34% of pottery studio experience revenue.

On the surface, this might look like a craving for a slower life. Most of us still want the subway to come quickly, though. We refresh the delivery map when our dinner is two blocks away. People are choosing to wait only when the waiting feels worthwhile. A columnist for The Cut calls it “friction-maxxing,” or choosing the less convenient option on purpose. The hope is that, by adding friction and rejecting digital tools, even for a moment, we can reconnect with ourselves.

That may be why analog hobbies and products keep resurfacing even though their digital replacements are objectively more convenient. Vinyl is bulky, fragile, and requires you to get up and flip the record over. And yet, U.S. vinyl wholesale revenue passed $1 billion in 2025, marking 19 consecutive years of growth.

The internet is very good at helping us leave the internet

If you teach, make, or sell the things people are slowing down for, today’s consumers are going to find you through a screen, even though what you're selling is freedom from one.

Pinterest’s report describes the platform as a place to find “a reason to get offline.” Someone might find their first knitting pattern there, learn a guitar chord on YouTube, fall in love with a point-and-shoot camera because Instagram made flash photography look cool, or see a ceramicist throwing clay on TikTok and decide they, too, want to get their hands dirty.

“Analog bags” were even trending this year—totes filled with screen-free activities, such as a journal, watercolors, a book, or a crochet project, so your hands have something to do besides scroll (which people discovered, ironically, on social media). The path offline now starts online.

One person’s journey might look something like this:

• At 11:47 PM, they watch a stranger filing, forming, and soldering a ring on TikTok.

At 11:47 PM, they watch a stranger filing, forming, and soldering a ring on TikTok.

• By breakfast, they’ve searched for “jewelry making classes near me.”

By breakfast, they’ve searched for “jewelry making classes near me.”

• They find a metalsmithing studio in their area, check the website, look through photos, and compare class times.

They find a metalsmithing studio in their area, check the website, look through photos, and compare class times.

• They reserve a spot for Saturday at 2:00 PM, pay on their phone, and add the class to their calendar on that same phone.

They reserve a spot for Saturday at 2:00 PM, pay on their phone, and add the class to their calendar on that same phone.

• Saturday comes and they spend three hours unable to light up their screen because their fingers are occupied.

Saturday comes and they spend three hours unable to light up their screen because their fingers are occupied.

• They leave wearing a simple silver ring.

They leave wearing a simple silver ring.

That doesn’t feel like technology disappearing from our lives. Instead, its role is becoming more specific. The screen helps you get somewhere, but the experience starts when you put it away.

Nobody wants an analog booking process

Before that person could learn how to make jewelry, they needed to know what beginner class to take, how much it costs, whether materials are included, and whether their preferred time slot has room. None of those questions become more charming because the studio sells an analog experience. The same goes for almost every business benefiting from this analog movement.

Someone might enjoy waiting for film to develop. They probably don’t enjoy wondering whether the lab received the order. A violin student can accept that learning new scales will take time. Coordinating next Tuesday’s music lesson across nine emails is unlikely to deepen their appreciation for the craft.

There’s a useful line between the effort that gives an experience character and the effort that keeps someone from buying it. Businesses have spent years being told to remove friction, and that remains important even when the product is something people value precisely because it requires patience, skill, attention, or time.

In fact, online channels accounted for 63% of pottery studio revenue in 2025, according to . A customer might agree to wrestle with clay, but they shouldn’t have to wrestle with the booking process too.

The slow work runs on fast tools

In a 2026 Squarespace survey of 592 service businesses, 67% of respondents agreed that clients are less likely to book when they can’t do it online. Among those who don’t use Squarespace, roughly one in four spend more than 16 hours a week, about two full workdays, on admin tasks like inquiries, scheduling, and payments.

No one’s daydreaming about that part. A studio with 10 wheels needs 10 students in those seats before they can inspire the next makers. A music teacher with limited private lesson hours can’t afford a double booking. Someone teaching embroidery out of a small studio might be trying to sell a six-week course, a one-night workshop, take-home kits, and gift cards.

With Squarespace, you can build a professional website to turn an analog hobby into a thriving business. Design an engaging portfolio and sell products, like kits or prints, from the same place. Or, use Acuity Scheduling to book clients. Set your availability, cap each class at the seats you have, collect intake forms, and send reminders. The slow, hands-on part stays with you while the booking and payment work runs in the background.

People are choosing effort that means something, which gives digital platforms a clear job: take care of everything else. In the same survey, 43% of respondents who use Squarespace now spend less than five hours per week on administrative work.

Build a website for the analog movement

Behind the analog movement is a very modern way of doing business. With the right setup, your customers will find you on a screen and remember the hours they spent away from one.

Squarespace can help you design a website, start selling products, and accept bookings online that take more people offline. See what you can build with a free trial today.