Before the advent of streaming and DVDs, families could watch their favorite movies at home on VHS tapes. While many have left those tapes to collect dust in the attic, a new social media trend is bringing the bygone tech into 2026.
Some parents are rewinding the clock and introducing VHS tapes in what is quickly becoming a new viral trend. These parents say VHS tapes tend to feature “slower-paced shows,” and that the lengthy previews featured at the beginning help teach their kids patience.
Earlier this year, TikTok user Janie George said she canceled her family’s Disney+ and Netflix subscriptions, opting instead for her kids to watch shows on VHS tapes.
“Hoping to cultivate a longer attention span with slower-paced shows, full-length movies, watching previews, and having to rewind the movie again. Trying to teach that we don’t always get the exact show or episode we want at any given moment,” she wrote in a TikTok post that’s been viewed more than 890,000 times.
Another TikTok user, who goes by the handle @reelmomstuff, shared a viral video about the trend in March. She explained that the tapes teach her kids patience, adding that there’s no “instant gratification” because they have to sit through “20 minutes of previews.”
“If you want to raise patient kids, you should show them movies on VHS,” she said.
TikToker Madi Swegle said VHS tapes also help parents monitor the media their kids are consuming.
“We know exactly what they’re watching,” she wrote in a February post, adding that her kids are “learning patience” because there’s “no instant switching every two seconds.”
VHS tapes were first introduced in the 1970s, allowing people to watch their favorite movies and shows at home whenever they wanted, in most cases for the first time. Some of the first hits to come out on VHS included The Sound of Music and M.A.S.H. The technology gave birth to video rental shops and chains like Blockbuster, where people could rent a movie for a few dollars and then return it – preferably rewound to the beginning – the next day.
The tech’s popularity skyrocketed over the next two decades, but VHS tapes began to fall by the wayside when movies and shows started coming out on DVD in the late 1990s. Now, streaming services like Netflix and Hulu reign supreme.
These days, it seems most VHS tapes are tucked away in storage or sitting in bins at second-hand stores. But demand could soon go up if this social media trend continues to grow.
“Get on it now, because I have a feeling this trend is going to continue to go, and because of it prices are going to go up,” TikTok user @samanthavklase told her followers in April.
