The '90s Weren't All That: People Are Sharing The Things They Do Not Miss About The Decade

As much as millennials and Gen X'ers tend to romanticize the '90s, there were both little and big things that were commonplace then that make living now in the current day soooo much better. For example, one I don't often see brought up is how TVs had terrible resolutions and, for the most part, were no bigger than around 32 inches. This made it so you really had to focus on the screen, and because of the low-res, it was easy to miss so many details in TV shows, movies, and music videos.

Recently, Reddit user Maester_Maetthieux was curious about those things that, in hindsight, were not so great back then when they asked : "What do you NOT miss about the '90s?"

The thread got hundreds of responses from people who lived through the '90s. Below are the top, best, and most-often repeated comments:

1. "Going to the video store incredibly excited, only for you to find out that what you wanted was out of stock."

2. "Paying $15 for a CD. On the other hand, though, I miss the excitement of getting a new CD and how invested you would be in your music collection. Those are definitely related: if it costs more, you're more invested in it. But, still, $15 definitely feels like a lot of money for one CD."

3. "Dial-up internet"

4. "Driving to my job to get my paycheck and then having to drive to the bank before it closed. I'd always get to the bank at 4:50 p.m., and there would always be some elderly lady in front of me needing her account balance explained to her. Never failed, lol."

5. "As a Black woman, having my hair straightened because that's just what was done. I love the freedom of wearing my hair in its natural state without having chemically straightened hair be the only acceptable way."

6. "Blowing on NES cartridges to get them to work."

7. "I don't miss not having the internet. In the early '90s, before the internet, my world was so small. If it didn't exist in my little town, it might as well have never existed — music, books, films, diversity, hobbies, and so much more. I love having virtually any song ever made at my fingertips. I love being able to look up any subject I come across and learn about it."

8. "Listening to the radio waiting for your favorite song to come on so you can record it on a tape...only for the DJ to cut in at the end and ruin the whole recording."

9. "Long road trips. They are definitely better now that we are able to be entertained. I mean 100 miles of nothing."

10. "Pay phones. You never knew if it worked or how recently someone peed on it. They were also magnets for people looking for bum change or cigarettes. Speaking of change, you better make sure you had some yourself, or you were SOL. No one had cellphones, so you were calling their home phone hoping they were nearby and [would] pickup. Also, just the availability of them was a hassle. They were everywhere but also somehow never where you need one. They could also get backed up, forming lines/queues."

11. "Long-distance phone calls and their ridiculous charges — even if you just called a town 30 miles away. Plus, the constant commercials on TV for long distance phone providers!"

12. "Probably a hot take, but physical media. Not having to carry a CD collection in the car, not having a cabinet full of VHS tapes, and not having a tower of jewel cases for computer games is convenient. (Yes, I know there’s no guarantee digital media will be accessible at all times, but it’s convenient when it works, which, in my experience, is always.)"

13. "When ordering anything through the mail, it could take anywhere from four weeks to six months. You had no way of knowing if there were any updates or when it might show up. If you had relatives overseas and I wanted to send you a Christmas present, yeah, that was going to take hundreds of dollars and four months at least. Plus, when it arrived, it was typically torn apart by customs."

14. "All the smoking in public areas. I remember several times growing up when my family had to wait an hour-plus at a restaurant because the only free seats were in the smoking area."

15. "Everyone sharing one phone/phone number in the house."

16. "Everyone loves how the lack of phones let people be disconnected. But, I hated being totally in the dark when someone was late picking me up for something or meeting me somewhere."

17. And lastly, "Paying per MINUTE of internet usage was insane."

You can read the original thread on Reddit .

Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.