During the holidays, I, like many teenage girls across the country, spent a generous portion of my time scrolling on TikTok. As I scrolled in the backseat on the way to a family reunion or escaped to my room for 10 minutes of peace, one trend kept popping up among the countless GRWM, OOTD, and POV videos on my FYP: going analog.

Now, the idea of “going analog” isn’t anything new. As trends emerge and become popular among the masses, counterculture inevitably swoops in with their own resistance to the new social norms. Take, for example, the recent popularity of the record. After the rise of major streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music, popular culture shifted and records became the new “it” item. Now, I can’t go into a Target, Walmart or Barnes & Noble without seeing a massive section dedicated to the newest vinyl releases. 

However, it seems that for 2026 the hottest new trend is to ditch technology altogether. And let me just say—I’m all for it. 

With the rise of AI and the release of yet another iPhone, it seems to me that people are getting tired of the endless amounts of technology being released. I know I am. Half of the time, I feel as if it’s corporate rhetoric being shoved down my throat. My iPhone 14 works just fine. My headphones are perfectly usable. Not to mention, I can write my own essays without the help of ChatGPT or other generative AI programs. 

Furthermore, the agenda being pushed by these companies that more tech is better is simply wrong. The truth is, by using technology like AI to supplement human creation, people get dumber, especially when it comes to education. Way back during COVID, concerns arose around the academic merit of students interested in going into fields such as medicine, law or business, simply for the fact that they weren’t going to school in-person. Many creators joked on social media, “How am I supposed to trust a doctor that graduated from Zoom University?” That was 2020; now, instead of COVID, AI is what poses a legitimate concern. Think about it: would you trust a surgeon who couldn’t even write their own essays?

This is why I am so into the idea of going analog. Aside from discouraging people from using technology to do their work for them, the trend also pushes people to get out of their own heads and into the real world. However, the purpose of going analog isn’t to abandon technology entirely; rather, it offers physical substitutes to current online apps or programs. 

One of my favorite examples of this is to print out pictures and make a physical scrapbook as opposed to letting pictures sit in iCloud. I recently tried scrapbooking after seeing video after video promoting it on social media, and I can attest that it is just as fun as it looks. Not only did I spend time doing something creative, but actively choosing to turn away from technology showed me how rewarding it is to go offline.

While this is just one example of how my life was positively affected by shifting to physical media, there are countless other options for the everyday consumer. Writing in a journal, cooking a recipe from a cookbook, and using a physical alarm clock are all examples of simple analog substitutions that can be made in place of technology. 

Although this entire journey started with using social media as an escape, going analog has reminded me that sometimes the best way to disconnect from the noise is to simply put the phone down.