Big hair, Sex and the City and the “photo dump”: Peak Millennial is back and the era’s trends are taking on a new life.
They trolled us for being old when we hit our 30s, old-fashioned for remembering a time before email and for being “cringe” as we kept wearing our skinny jeans and ankle socks.
Oh, how the tables have turned.
Gen Z and younger generations are picking up where we, their (slightly) older counterparts, left off in the 2000s.
The Gen Z girlies are watching Sex and the City and living their best Carrie Bradshaw lifestyles. Those Facebook albums of blurry photos of a night out? They’re back, repackaged as an Instagram “photo dump”. Ditto for big hair and wired headphones.
“I do like seeing how a younger generation interprets an older trend when it comes back around,” said Erin Miller, 35, a TikTok creator and self-proclaimed 1990s and 2000s historian. She wasn’t surprised that many trends loved by millennials were making a comeback. “Does it remind me of my age? Yes.”
But that’s not to say everything is the same. Millennials (typically those born from the early 1980s to the late ’90s) had infomercials and mail-order. Gen Z and Alpha have TikTok makeup tutorials and fast fashion. Bradshaw’s cosmopolitan has been exchanged for an Aperol spritz.
Members of generations Z and Alpha are putting their own mark on once-ubiquitous phenomena, and according to Miller, they’re the winners: “I think they are doing it better.”
We’re just happy that our trends have held up so well – enjoy them, Gen Z, you’ll be criticised by a younger generation before you know it.
Here are 11 millennial trends that are being revived.
Big hair
Big hair isn’t a fad; it’s a lifestyle.
Just look at Dolly Parton or Beyoncé.
But there are periods when the big hair gets, well, bigger. And when it seems to be everywhere – including on the biggest albums, red carpets and magazine covers – as we’re seeing right now.
Jen Atkin, a celebrity hairstylist based in Seattle who founded the hair-care brand OUAI, said she has noticed big hair “coming back in an undone, still natural way,” adding, “It’s been popping up on runways, red carpets and TikTok of course.”
During the Great Recession, Kelly Bennett, a former hairstylist whose mortgage brokerage was “tanking,” invented the Bumpit.
She recalled a recurring issue that her salon clients complained about: “Everybody had a problem with getting volume in the crown of their hair.” She would try to show them tricks, but they often could not replicate it at home. “I used to daydream about this little thing,” she said, “just a space taker is all it’s supposed to be.”
A few homemade prototypes later, the Bumpit was born.
The tiny plastic insert that lifted one’s roots exploded in popularity. It reached Oprah and Ellen and was sold at Sally Beauty Supply, Claire’s and Walmart. Bennett and her family, who helped with the business, sold 10 million Bumpits in three years at the peak of the business, she said.
The business slowed as straighter, less tousled hairstyles took over. But Bennett, now 62 and living in Cambria, California, is seeing a resurgence of the hairstyles of the early 2000s.
“Flat hair is out; big hair is in,” she said.
Atkin agreed: “I just saw Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter show and it’s all about big, sculptural glam,” she said. “Off the stage, ’90s layered cuts are everywhere, which add volume and shape.” (A headline earlier this year noted the return of “Bumpit-style ponytails” seen on Nicole Kidman and Angelina Jolie, among others, at the Golden Globes.)
Whatever your chosen hairstyle or method for giving it some lift, both Bennett and Atkin suggest finding what works best for you.
As Bennett put it, “If your hair is good, your day is good.”
– Melina Delkic
Sex and the City
Much about the lifestyles on Sex and the City has been rendered obsolete. Landlines. Answering machines. A weekly newspaper column. Whole milk.
So why is Gen Z so into the show?
“It’s really like a time capsule,” said Elisa Zuritsky, a longtime writer on Sex and the City and now on the sequel series And Just Like That. “There’s an awareness of what was lost.”
Carrie Bradshaw, the show’s protagonist, also remains an aspirational figure. On TikTok, users have reminded people that if you’re 32, you’re only in Season 1 of Sex and the City. Carrie is a reminder that you don’t need to have your whole life figured out at that age. The best is yet to come.
Now, New York City is filled with a new generation of 20-somethings who are living out their best Sex and the City fantasies. (The Cut recently deemed them “West Village Girls”.)
The best part of that lifestyle – besides the clothes and the romance – may just be Carrie’s friendships. “That is the real fantasy, not all the sex they were having,” said Julie Rottenberg, another longtime Sex and the City writer. “How do these busy women have time to sit down and have coffee?”
Carrie is also deeply flawed, Rottenberg said. “Those are the best characters,” she said. “Those are the ones who get under our skin. Who infuriate us or activate us. Who allow us to feel less alone.”
That connection to the characters is what many young people still feel when watching the show.
“There’s an authenticity inside of it and I think that will always be fresh,” said Jason Lewis, who played Smith, one of Samantha’s love interests. “We may always push back against the ideas of the generations before us, but when we find something authentic, it’s easy to connect to.”
— Claire Moses
Wired headphones
You pull your headphones out of your bag only to find a string of tangles and knots. After about five minutes of tedious untying, you plug them into your device and hit play. You try to walk around the room with them, without realising that you left your device on a surface, and bam! It goes crashing to the ground.
Any millennial can recall the experience. And with a plethora of Bluetooth options, one would think that the end of wired headphones would be celebrated. But for many Gen Zers, going back to wired headphones is all the rage.
Fans of wired headphones say they are more affordable and one less device in your arsenal that you have to charge or for which you need a wireless connection: simply plug in and go.
“Bluetooth is too clunky to carry around all the time, in my opinion,” said Phaja Alexandre, a recent high school graduate in Orlando, Florida.
He still uses Bluetooth headphones while working out or travelling: “It kind of gives less of a hassle,” he added.
Although Bluetooth headphones hit the market in 2004, wireless headphones didn’t quite hit their stride until after 2016, when Apple released its AirPods.
In 2021 The Wall Street Journal reported that people were going back to wired headphones, with celebrities such as Dua Lipa, Paul Mescal and Gigi Hadid being spotted with them. One Instagram account, @WiredItGirls, even documents influencers and famous people wearing them.
According to an analysis of the earphone market by Future Market Insights, even though most headphone users go wireless, the market for wired earphones is holding strong, especially with gamers and musicians.
Wired headphones “will never die,” the report said, in part because of their “superior quality audio signal, no latency problems, and low price”.
– Gina Cherelus
Moustaches
Iconic ’staches have adorned upper lips since time immemorial: Theodore Roosevelt and Salvador Dalí, Charlie Chaplin and Albert Einstein, Hulk Hogan and Eddie Murphy, Tom Selleck and Burt Reynolds. Until 1916, it was actually mandatory that British soldiers not shave their upper lips.
Millennials saw a resurgence of the lip caterpillar as neo-hipster culture peaked in the mid-2010s (sending the soul patch of the 1990s and early aughts packing).
Millennial moustaches could be spotted accessorising man buns, thick-rimmed black glasses, black skinny jeans, knit beanies and fedoras. In hand? A craft beer, naturally. The design of a classic old-timey mustachio was even tattooed on countless fingers to create a cheeky little illusion when held up.
Now, about a decade after that trend fell by the wayside, the ’stache is back – though different. Justin Bieber, Harry Styles and Timothée Chalamet have recently sported scraggly, struggling ones – a kind of creep chic.
Benson Boone and Travis Kelce have been rocking a thick, bushy variety that seems equal parts machismo flex and Freddie Mercury flamboyance. Who’s to blame – or thank – for this revival? Maybe Miles Teller (GQ compared his to “the eighties porno ’stache”), whose character in the 2022 film Top Gun: Maverick inspired scores of young men. Immediately after the movie’s release, videos tagged #topgunmustache flooded TikTok.
But these days, as trends are fickle, could the moustache fall out of favour soon? Well, if a stroll through Bushwick in Brooklyn or Silver Lake in Los Angeles is any indication, not just yet.
– Maya Salam
Recession pop
For an economic forecast, ditch your finance apps and open Spotify instead. There, you’ll find the resurgence of recession pop – a genre of songs that either reflect our financial concerns or offer an escape into a mindless rave.
Journalist Ed Powers is often credited with coining the term “recession pop” in a 2009 column for The Irish Independent. He made the case that Lady Gaga’s upbeat music and larger-than-life persona gave people a distraction from reading about credit default swaps and Lehman Bros.
Sixteen years later, artists like Chappell Roan are adding earworms like Hot to Go to the genre, and people on social media are gleefully celebrating its return. Spotify’s Recession Pop Mix serves songs that were either popular during the Great Recession or current tracks that sound similar.
The 2009 hit song Party in the USA by Miley Cyrus makes an appearance with a chorus blissfully devoid of a deeper meaning:
“So I put my hands up” ...
“They’re playin’ my song, the butterflies fly away
I’m noddin’ my head like, ‘Yeah’
Movin’ my hips like, ‘Yeah’”
On a popular recession pop playlist made by Shayla Cava, 29, a San Francisco-area music promoter, songs like Jay Sean’s 2009 hit Down, made the list. Lil Wayne raps on the track, mixing romance with a commentary on the struggling economy that year, when the US was at the tail end of the Great Recession:
“Don’t you ever leave the side of me; indefinitely, not probably; and honestly, I’m down like the economy.”
Today, not only is Lady Gaga still on the charts, but so are newer artists like Shaboozey, who laments in A Bar Song (Tipsy) about the struggle of affording necessities and expensive gifts for his partner, and about a taxing job that doesn’t seem to cover enough.
There is still a sense of partying despite the worries; Lil Wayne is at a club and Shaboozey is at a saloon. Other artists who have dabbled in recession pop, such as Tate McRae, Benson Boone and Charli XCX, still sing about fun and parties, usually at a high BPM.
“There is definitely a sense of hedonism in it all and partying the pain away,” Cava said.
— Hank Sanders
Photo dumps
The flash of the digital cameras turned our pupils red. We did not know the best angles but hammed it up for the camera, arms curled around friends and often a hand on our hip. We were at house parties, club nights, birthday dinners, road trips. And when the photos were uploaded by the dozens, if not hundreds, we sifted through them with excitement.
That’s how we did it in 2010. But things aren’t so different in 2025. Digital cameras, bad angles and photo dumps are back, albeit with a modern touch.
“When it first started, people were like, ‘Oh my God, make Instagram casual again,’” said Jasmine Koong, 24, who works in media advertising and describes herself as a “serial” photo dumper. And casual, as the word suggests, is the point of the photo dump: a glut of snapshots, often shared on Instagram.
Photo dumps might catalogue a vacation or a month of concerts, or they could have a visual theme. But though they can take care and time to create, the impression is supposed to be “intentionally unfiltered,” Koong said. “People like to use it to make it look so effortless. Like: ‘I barely tried. It’s just my coffee.’”
Last year, Instagram expanded its carousel posts to allow 20 photos. “I think it has a wide appeal and it will stick around for a little while,” Koong said.
I go back to the archives, cringing, to flick through old Facebook albums, hundreds of photos crammed under titles like “spring breakers,” “road trip” and, inexplicably, “turn up the love”.
But the less curated a photo dump is, the more entertaining it can be, according to Koong. “Those are my favourite co-workers to stalk,” she says with a laugh.
— Isabella Kwai
Choreographed dances
Huddled around a desktop Gateway computer in the basement of my friend’s house, we watched three guys on YouTube showing off one of the first dance crazes of the digital era: Crank That (Soulja Boy).
Dodging spyware pop-ups – courtesy of LimeWire downloads – we played the video dozens of times to study the footwork, the snaps and, of course, the “youuu”. We practised it for hours with an attention to detail that I’m sure our parents wished we had saved for geometry class.
That summer, it seemed that everywhere you went, people were dancing the steps and even putting their own spin on them. There were thousands of Crank Dat tutorial videos, including versions called Crank Dat Batman and Crack Dat Lion King. It gave birth to a genre of songs based around dance moves, including Teach Me How to Dougie, Swag Surfin’, Walk It Out, Stanky Legg, Chicken Noodle Soup and Watch Me (Whip/Nae Nae).
Fast forward 17 years, what was once novel is now everywhere. Hundreds of thousands of videos on TikTok each month show expertly choreographed dances performed in living rooms and dance studios, and on the street.
In 2020, Jalaiah Harmon, who was 14 at the time, caused a sensation when a dance she created called the Renegade spread like wildfire across the internet, fuelled by TikTok. Suddenly it was no longer just artists creating dance moves, but fans as well. The Apple Dance Challenge drove millions to Charli XCX’s Brat album and helped make it one of the most streamed recordings last year.
@charlixcx an apple a day ;)
♬ Apple - Charli xcx
Even the renowned choreographer Fatima Robinson takes inspiration from social media: “TikTok and YouTube – I just find it so much fun,” she told NPR last year. “It’s an inspiring place to go to see how young people are moving their bodies.”
My days of learning new dances ended with The Jerk, so my algorithm doesn’t show me many of these new dances.
But one did get through the other day. A dance to a remix of Maps by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs – made up of simplistic hand swipes, hip pats and a two-step – took me back to 2007 and the spirit of what made those dances so much fun. While I didn’t attempt to learn the moves, it did give me a newfound appreciation for the teens who are out there doing dance challenges, and holding up traffic on my way to the chiropractor.
— Brent Lewis
Hair accessories
I didn’t have a little sister to play dress-up with when I was growing up, but I did have a little brother who was kind enough to let me adorn his crown of curls with my favourite 1990s hair accessory: fruit clips.
So imagine my surprise when the accessory came roaring back, only this time the fruit-shaped plastic clips are sturdier with more lifelike – and even life-size – designs.
These days it’s not uncommon to see a banana holding a sweep of hair in place. Or a butterfly, cat, flower, piece of sushi, eight ball, mushroom or pickle, for that matter.
Braided hair wraps, hair cuffs, hair charms, woven headbands, berets, claw clips and bandannas have all made a roaring comeback. Even oversize scrunchies, once mocked for being thoroughly uncool, are making their way to red carpets.
“It doesn’t need to be a full crazy look,” said Haley Heckmann, 31, a hairstylist in Los Angeles. “You can enhance a look as effortless with something simple.”
The approach follows a general less-is-more vibe for Gen Z and younger generations. Hair accessories offer that flair and a chance to personalise, Heckmann said.
The mix has landed a millennial mainstay front and centre once again: Claire’s, once a must-visit for first piercings and affordable accessories, is experiencing a renaissance of sorts as colourful clips and zigzag headbands (ouch!) make their way back into hair routines.
It’s less about what accessory Gen Z is reaching for and more about “how they’re wearing it and how they’re feeling about it,” said Alisha Chadha, the senior vice president for global merchandising at Claire’s.
One of the most popular items at C.O. Bigelow, the oldest apothecary in New York City, is the humble tortoiseshell headband, which came off dusty shelves in the basement when TikTok users discovered it had been the go-to accessory for Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy, an original fashion influencer of the 1990s whose style has come back with younger generations.
Whimsical claw clips also bring in younger customers. When Carolina DelRio, C.O. Bigelow’s general manager, first started working at the store 14 years ago, “it was just very classic, boring pieces; everything was brown or black, berets or headbands,” she said. Now, they practically have a garden of clips on display.
“New Yorkers, we wear black, brown and beige a lot,” she said. “A pop of colour adds something to the outfit.”
Physical media
In a world where streaming services for music and movies are the norm, some young people are digging through thrift store bins to find their favourite works on DVD, VHS, CD and cassette.
On TikTok, people praise one another in the comments for colour-coordinated DVD shelves or for snagging used silver CD players from Goodwill. One commented that they were “foaming at the mouth” over a TikTok showing off a VHS collection, complete with horror classics like Prom Night and The Grudge.
The TikTok account for Tylers Tapes, a business that creates custom VHS tapes of movies, television shows and music videos, has amassed more than 100,000 followers.
The Recording Industry Association of America has found in its yearly revenue reports that physical music sales have kept growing after a “remarkable resurgence” that began in 2021. Revenue from sales of physical music formats reached US$2 billion ($3.3b) in 2024, a 5% increase from the previous year.
Marc McCloud, owner of Orbit DVD in Asheville, North Carolina, said that people still buy thousands of DVDs and VHS tapes from his store and online business every week. He said many of the movies people buy are not carried by streaming services, but for some, collecting them is more about sentimentality.
Younger people often gravitate to movies by Wes Anderson and David Lynch, McCloud said.
“The VHS market has gotten a little nuts,” he said, adding that he noticed many millennials had started collecting the old tapes. “We’ve noticed with younger people that they’re actually collecting the next generation up, which is DVDs.”
“It’s their memory, their nostalgia.”
- Sara Ruberg
Wide-leg jeans
It is difficult to imagine the skaters, ravers and nu-metal headbangers from the late 1990s without their gigantic JNCO jeans.
Wildly flared with leg openings as huge as 125cm in circumference, JNCOs (the name stands for Judge None; Choose One or Journey of the Chosen Ones, depending on whom you ask) were adored in many subcultures; in the mainstream, they were mocked and even feared until skinny jeans conquered all in the 2000s.
Despite a brief attempt at a revival a decade ago, JNCOs couldn’t escape becoming a punchline. But in recent years, after another relaunch in 2019, JNCOs appear to have found a rebirth with Gen Z.
Videos of young people showing off their JNCOs, vintage and new, have spread on TikTok and Instagram.
Many have been viewed millions of times, with comments from legions of admirers. Even celebrities like Justin Bieber have been spotted in JNCOs.
The trend has baffled and amused many millennials. In a discussion on Reddit about the JNCOs comeback, one user commented: “I just donated my old ones to Goodwill a few months ago. I probably made some kid very happy.”
Vintage JNCOs can sell for well north of US$1000, and the company continues to sell new jeans, including the giant offerings that have defined the brand for three decades. They include the Mammoth, with a leg opening circumference of 100cm. And then there is the Crime Scene, with its jaw-dropping 127cm openings.
And while a new generation is getting the look right, pairing the jumbo jeans with metallic wallet chains (obviously) and T-shirts with loud designs, JNCOs are still a bit of a punchline.
Erin Miller, a TikTok creator, put the capacity of JNCO pockets to the test, and managed to fit a lot, including a lava lamp. But despite the gags, it appears this generation is willing to give JNCOs a real shot, without a care for the haters. And that, as in the ’90s, was kind of the point.
– Qasim Nauman
Pokémon
A pair of whimsical video games featuring adorable but powerful monsters hit the Japanese market in 1996, starting a franchise – Pokémon – that came to encompass a megahit animated TV series and a card-game colossus.
Three decades later, we still may not have reached peak Pokémon.
The media franchise, regarded as the world’s most valuable, has had waves of popularity since the two Game Boy games, Pocket Monsters Red and Green (released as Red and Blue outside Japan), first became a sensation.
There was the summer of Pokémon Go in 2016, the YouTube unboxings of cards during the loneliness of the pandemic and the release of a hit mobile trading game last year.
This latest surge, driven by a potent mix of video game mania and millennial nostalgia, is pushing the franchise to new heights. In the last five years, the value of Pokémon trading cards has increased by 240%, according to Collectors, which grades collectables including cards.
Wolfe Glick, a world champion competitive Pokémon gamer who fell in love with the franchise while watching the TV series as a child, recalled showing up to an internship a decade ago and finding that all of his co-workers were playing Pokémon Go.
“That was a really crazy moment,” said Glick, 29. “I was like: ‘Oh, wait, a second, what’s going on here? This is my thing. Why are you all doing my thing?’”
Pat Flynn, whose Instagram page, Deep Pocket Monster, has more than a million followers, said he did not follow the franchise closely until the pandemic, when his children became enraptured. The key to Pokémon’s enduring popularity, he said, is the community.
“People just in general have been craving connection,” said Flynn, 42. With Pokémon, he added, “They’re feeling a sense of belonging.”
– Tim Balk
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Written by: Remy Tumin and Claire Moses
©2025 THE NEW YORK TIMES