Back in July, content creator Catherine Goetze — better known as AskCatGPT — posted a TikTok video announcing: “I’m committed to bringing down my screen time this year, but I know I need to be reachable in case of emergency.” In it, she showcased retro landline telephones she’d connected to her smartphone via Bluetooth, letting her answer important calls while avoiding the inevitable pull of her iPhone screen and its endless scroll.
The response was immediate, and the video has now been viewed 5.6 million times, with over 600,000 likes. “It was like a moth to a flame,” she says. “It was very clear there was something there.” That “something” materialized as a wave of engagement across platforms. Goetze’s “no-phone morning” video, where she answers important calls through her landline while keeping her smartphone out of reach, earned over 190,000 likes. Then, when she hosted a no-phone party in October, over 1,000 people RSVP’d and 700 attended; the reel documenting the event collected nearly 180,000 likes.
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For Goetze, whose rise came through explaining AI and tech culture, the reaction amounts to a collective turning point. “People are really turned off by technology right now,” she says. “They’re turned off by AI, and by the way we tend to conflate AI with social media and our phones. Over the past year, it’s congealed into this moment of people saying, ‘I’ve seen enough. Too much screen time is starting to affect my day-to-day life and I have to take a stance against that impact.’”
What she’s describing has crystallized into what many are calling “unplugging”, as consumers return to analog. The Global Wellness Summit’s The Future of Wellness trend report named analog wellness as its top trend for 2025, while “analog bags” (tote bags filled with books, puzzles and art supplies) have gone viral on TikTok as Gen Z seeks to curb doomscrolling. “It stems from a desire to step out of an increasingly noisy and exhausting social media landscape overrun with AI-generated slop, in which it’s becoming near impossible to discern truth from fiction,” says Katie Baron, content director at trends intelligence agency Stylus. “Stepping back into the ‘real world’ is the only antidote.” Baron points to Harris Poll data, which reveals that 67% of Americans long for the “pre-plugged-in” era, while 79% of US Gen Zs actively aspire to interact more in the physical world.
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The fashion industry is already responding. After several years spent experimenting with digital activations — NFTs, video games, virtual fashion shows — the pendulum is swinging back to offline. Zines are resurging as creators and luxury houses embrace printed matter as an antidote to digital burnout. For example, Talia Byre released a limited-edition zine to accompany her Fall/Winter 2025 collection, while Chanel debuted its Arts Culture Magazine in June. Meanwhile, when Paloma Wool opened her Barcelona flagship earlier this month, she told Vogue in an article titled “Paloma Wool is escaping the endless scroll” that she wants the store to transcend shoppers’ FYPs, adding a gallery and a bookstore so it can function as a third space. Fashion’s buzziest new nightlife opening, Lost, launched in October with a party hosted by Mark Ronson, requires guests to have their mobile devices sealed in secure pouches.
Goetze believes this is only the beginning. “I call it the ‘analog renaissance’, because it’s not so much about getting rid of something as adopting older ways of doing things. It’s one of the number one trends — if not the number one trend — for brands to track in 2026,” she says.
From digital fatigue to analog aspiration
If smartphones have been ubiquitous since 2010, why has this analog turn accelerated now? Although frustration with digital life has been building for years, the past six months have marked a tipping point. Consumers are actively seeking tools and products — from at-home lock boxes to devices that physically block access to social media — to keep themselves off their phones. While the latest TikTok trend, “having-a-life-core”, celebrates those who are “touching grass” to feel more connected to reality and participating more fully in the outdoor world.
“Digital has finally hit diminishing returns,” says Shaun Singh, founder of media company Death to Stock (DTS). “The digital ecosystem promised connection and delivered surveillance. Every gesture is tracked, predicted and monetized, and fed back to algorithmic overlords in the lifeless shape of data. After a decade, people want their sovereignty back. Analog has become a refuge, not because it’s old or outdated, but because it renders you, the consumer, untouchable.”
Goetze believes the timing is the result of three converging forces. First, technological adoption cycles. “Technology takes time to truly become part of the fabric of society, it might have taken 10 to 15 years for us to really feel it.” Second, the pandemic, which pushed screen time “over a ledge”. And third, the rapid rise of AI-generated video and deepfakes, particularly on social platforms. “Social media is where we consume most content about what’s happening in the world,” she notes. “When people get freaked out, rightfully, about deepfakes being produced at scale for basically zero dollars, and what that means for their mental health and society… people just get super turned off.”
That anxiety is increasingly visible in culture. Vine’s recent relaunch, now known as DiVine, is anchored around a promise of no AI — a direct response to the ‘slop’ filling feeds. Shifting status norms speak to the same desire. “It feels very fashionable right now to say, ‘I’m not on social media,’ or ‘I have a flip phone,’” Goetze says. Indeed, earlier this month, The New Yorker declared that “It’s cool to have no followers now,” with writer Kyle Chayka noting that: “There’s a certain status that comes from ignoring the usual signs of success online, and an envy inspired by those who can grow a career without the pressure of performing on social media.” Meanwhile, brand strategy consultant Eugene Healey told Vogue Business earlier this year that “dressing in a way that reflects online micro-trends is increasingly viewed as a low-status trait.” The idea that it is stylish not to be online has filtered into consumer products, too: the inside flap of Goetze’s phone box reads, “Offline is the new luxury.”
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But whether this shift is merely another trend is, to Goetze, the wrong question. “I think this is actually a public health issue. Now that we have more data and more information about how all of these technologies are impacting people in real time, we need to make changes. In 2027, I still think people will want to get off their phones, but it might be so commonplace and obvious by then — thanks to the early adopters — that it’ll be less of a thing to talk about and more of a given.”
Considerations for brands
For brands, the opportunity — and the risk — lies in the execution. “The danger lies in treating analog as an aesthetic instead of a stance,” says DTS’s Singh. “Many brands want the halo without the discipline, producing parody instead of work that reflects dedicated craft.” Gentle Monster, he argues, offers a blueprint: “Their retail locations are not decorated to mimic analog; they’re physical environments that suspend time and pull you inward, built through slow, hard and expensive work.”
Authenticity also matters in how brands facilitate connection. Nature-led experiences are particularly resonant, says Hannah da Silva, founder and creative director of GorpGirls, who recently partnered with Burberry on four walks across Los Angeles, London, New York and Tokyo. “Enjoying nature with other people is extremely bonding… There is a big difference in energy and friendships forming during a walk outside compared to a normal brand-led activation, such as a party or dinner.” While the outdoors remains powerful, she expects the trend to evolve. “We’ll see more inner-city ways to disconnect that may not involve getting on a train out of the city into nature.”
The throughline, Singh says, is sincerity. “Brands who embrace analog with sincerity are building artifacts, while those who approach it with cynicism are just laundering digital assets through a grainy filter. Consumers can tell the difference instantly.” The genuine approach prioritizes presence over performance, while the hollow version results in “slow-living campaigns pumped out at high speed”, or unplug messaging pushed through frantic posting schedules. “Brands doing it right are building for the physical world again: zines, tactile retail experiences, ritual-based packaging. Engagement returning to its roots of tangibility and sensoriality. To engage is to touch, to touch is to experience.”
Goetze warns brands against overly literal no-phone positioning. “That’s going to get tired really fast and start feeling outdated,” she says. Instead, the focus should be on creating spaces that feel so present, so magnetic, that using a phone would feel out of place. Tactile elements help — charm-making stations, hands-on workshops, anything that gives people something to do with their hands. So does atmosphere: strong entertainment, sensory detail and design that invites immersion.
A final, practical consideration: documentation. “People feel less stressed about, ‘Oh my God, this event is so cool, I have to take photos,’ if you have a photographer or videographers capturing it for them and turning the photos around within 24 hours,” Goetze says.
