Vinyl’s having a big moment – and it’s not just pure nostalgia driving its comeback. We’re now seeing old-school turntables pop up everywhere from cool underground clubs to Gen Z Tik Tok sets and hybrid home setups.
In 2024, vinyl outsold CDs in the US for the second year running, and in the UK, record sales topped 5.9 million units in 2023 – and this is a trend that’s kept climbing into 2025. This is especially true for young people, with 76% of 18-24 year olds buying a vinyl record at least once per month, according to a Vinyl Alliance survey.
This trend has clearly spilled over into the DJ world too. Across livestream platforms and social media, vinyl DJing is gaining visibility again, with YouTube channels like My Analog Journal pulling in millions of views with vinyl-only sets. Whether it’s exclusive runs from independent labels, or LPs of huge commercial hits, more and more DJs are choosing to experiment with turntables.
So why are more DJs getting hands-on with vinyl in an increasingly digital world? It’s not just about looking cool or getting the ultimate DJ street cred (although that’s certainly a factor for some). It’s about having a more mindful and connected experience with the music – both in terms of the track selection and mixing.
Now, as much as many online forums and comments sections will make you think, there’s no need for any competition or rivalry between digital and vinyl DJs. In fact, we think that even if you’ve never touched a turntable before, there’s a lot to learn from the art of vinyl DJing. These are some of the things we think every DJ could learn from and incorporate into their practice.
Better music selection
As DJing is becoming more and more technologically advanced and algorithmically driven, vinyl feels like a conscious pushback on this. Streaming services have reshaped how we discover music, as they constantly feed us new recommendations. That’s been something of a double-edged sword as while it’s made the whole process of music discovery much easier, it’s also done away with a lot of the digging and decision making.
With vinyl, you’ve got to be much more selective. Going and diving through crates of records at your local vinyl store is a hands-on experience that really connects you with the music in a different way.
When you’re so limited with the tracks you can select, everything becomes much more intentional. Instead of just mindlessly cramming your USB full of hundreds of tracks off the Beatport charts, everything you pick will be considered. That means you really think more about your track selection, get a deeper knowledge of your collection and build a library based on quality, not quantity.
You’ll become more familiar with the ins and outs of each track – the structure, the vibes and how to mix it – in a way that you can’t possibly remember for an entire USB’s worth of tunes.
The art of ‘crate digging’ or searching for vinyl records is a popular pastime for vinyl purists – and the thrill of finding a hidden gem can be much more satisfying than something coming up on your Spotify algorithm.
Using your ears
Many digital DJs, especially when they’re just starting out, rely too much on visual cues for mixing. They’ll look at the waveforms on the screen and just watch whether they’re lined up to make sure everything’s synced up.
With vinyl, none of this is possible. Instead, you’ve got to use nothing but your ears. You’ve got to tune into the music and be able to manually ride the pitch fader, making minor adjustments to keep the tracks in sync. You start to understand how tempo and rhythm really work, rather than relying on digital tools to do it for you.
That experience transfers to digital gear, too, so you’ll be quicker and more confident in your mixes. There’s a reason we recommend that new controller DJs learn to beatmatch without looking at the screen. Firstly, you won’t spend all your set staring down at a screen rather than engaging with the crowd. Secondly, you’re set in case there’s some kind of technical issue, like the tracks not being properly analysed or the sync isn’t working properly.
This manual beatmatching skill is especially important for older genres like disco, where the beatgrids aren’t solid and consistent throughout the whole track. Trying to rely on beat sync when mixing these tracks is a surefire way to mess up. You need to hear when the beat is slipping out and know how to nudge it back, and these skills are second nature to any vinyl DJ.
👉 Check out our guide to manually beatmatching
Patience is key
With digital DJing, the temptation is always there to just mix as many songs as possible, as fast as possible. Often, as soon as you’ve finished transitioning into a new tune, you’re already scrolling through your library, searching for the next one to drop in.
Vinyl forces you to slow everything down a bit. There’s no previewing snippets of tracks or jumping through cue points. If you want to find a section of a certain track, you’ve got to get that record, get it on the turntable, drop the needle in and manually jog through and listen out for the right bit. When you have found the right part, the beatmatching takes much longer than just pressing sync on CDJs.
That means you’re not just rushing to play the next track. Instead, you’ve got to give the music room to breathe and ride out the groove for a bit longer. That changes how you think as a DJ. You develop a sense of patience and resist the urge to constantly do more just because you can. It’s a contrast to modern gear workflows you’ll find in options like the Pioneer DJ club setups.
This patience is a useful skill for modern digital DJs as well. If you’ve come from the vinyl experience, you’ll likely find yourself holding back a bit more. Next time you’re mixing on digital decks, give it a go. Slow yourself down and imagine how long it takes to go through the whole process of vinyl mixing. Taking that extra time will pay off – your audience will probably appreciate not being so rushed.
The ritual process of laying a record on the platter and dropping the needle on isn’t just satisfying – it also forces you to mix in a different, more considered way.
Takeaways from the turntables
Vinyl isn’t coming back because it’s convenient or easy. In fact, all the reasons it fell out of favour the first time around are the same reasons it’s now coming back. It’s inconvenient, it’s difficult to use and you’ve got to spend ages searching for music to play. But it’s not about being a snobby purist or rejecting modern gear for the sake of it.
The key is that working within these limitations can be really empowering. It teaches you how to listen and develop a much deeper understanding of the music and skills that will make any DJ more capable behind the decks.
So, even if you never plan on playing a full vinyl set, the skills you can learn from playing around on some records are 100% worth your time. And if you’re serious about levelling up as a DJ, this kind of hands-on experience is one of the best ways to do it.
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This is a very well written artictle. I learned how to DJ way back in the early 90’s on turntables – and they weren’t 1200’s either – so a couple of years later when I fnally got my hands on 1200’s (that my parents bought – because I was only 12 years old) I felt like a king. Digital tools are meant to help you and elevate your sets – but if you don’t mix with the same mentaility of mixing vinyl, you may in trouble. In fact, back in 2011, I sold my 1200 not only because I was living in a finacial crisis, but because I honestly felt the digital was the way to go and it caused the demise of vinyl. But years later, I felt I was missing something from my mixing and my DJ rig – so I went out and purchased a pair of PLX-1000, and more recently purchased a pair of CRSS12’s (which are by far the best turntables in the world IMO), and added them to my XZ rig and about every two weeks I put together a vinyl set on my Mixcloud from my own vinyl collection that I’ve brought back out, and newer stuff (not necessarily brand new meaning released this year) that I pick up every week or two from Discogs to add to my vinyl collection. I’ve even managed to pick up some vinyl only gigs in my neighborhood, and juist the overall feeling of mixing vinyl gives me a feeling that words just cannot describe – even mixing with DVS – it’s tacticle. I love it!