So I sell a single cd to a customer,send it off the next day after he ordered (like I do)send him the tracking number...anyways 9 days later he sends me a message saying he has not received his order,I check the tracking number and see it has arrived at a sorting plant in kentucky,his destination is in Illinois....I tell him to go to his local post office and give them the tracking number,I said it's out of my hands now and the USPS problem.....Today (after 3 weeks still no order)he gives me a negative review saying he did not get his order and I was not helpfull...I check his tracking number and it is on the move again at a different PO,and saying it will be delivered to his destination tomorrow!!!! WTF.....

Hello! Although I have been playing and collecting records for over 60 years, I have never sold a record on Discogs or even graded a record. I am about to start selling some of my records and would like some advice both from sellers and buyers.
I am not looking to squeeze the highest grade from a record; instead, I am aiming for a buyer to agree that my grade met their expectations. Here are some questions that, if you were to answer, would help me out.

1. Looking back to when you sold your first record on Discogs, what grading errors would you want to avoid?
2. How did you train yourself to distinguish between NM, VG+, VG, G+, and G? Were there particular examples, exercises, reference records, videos, or articles you would recommend?
3. Do you visually grade first and then play-grade each record or do you play-grade only some?
4. Which small things might cause beginners to overgrade a record: fingerprints, surface noise, spindle marks, label wear, writing on labels and covers, etc.?
5. How do you handle borderline cases? If something looks VG+ except for one small flaw, do you call it VG?
6. Should a brand-new seller be more conservative? Is grading a borderline VG+ record as VG a good way to start?
7. Do you supplement your grades by actually describing the individual defects in your listing rather than depending entirely upon the grade?
8. Do you have any special kind of a setup for grading, such as special lighting or magnification?
9. What does someone with a lot of experience see that a beginner sometimes misses?
10. Would you recommend selling some inexpensive records first to establish a reputation before listing more expensive records?
11. If a buyer disagrees with your grade, how would good sellers handle it?

Did I leave any questions out that you think would be helpful?

Thanks so much for sharing your experience with me and anyone who might read this post.

Over time, for various reasons (usually me being dumb and forgetting to remove a record from my wantlist when I buy it at a brick and mortar or eBay), I've ended up with some records that are in both my collection and my wantlist. There are very few of these that are on purpose (though there are a few where I own a crappy copy but would like to upgrade, or I own a reissue but would like to also own the original, etc).

Is there a quicker / more efficient way to find these than going through each item in my wantlist? My wantlist is big (nearly 8,000 items), so I'd rather not do it that way. I suppose I could download both lists and cross-reference by title (I think?) ... is that the best way?

Thanks in advance!

My apologies if this has been asked and answered already. Does Discogs keep a list of the recordings I have bought over time from various sellers, and if so, how do I access that list?

I searched the website but could not find my purchase history anywhere (and the Discogs chatbot was useless for answering this question). Thanks for the help!

I appreciate all these fast and direct answers - and as you have said, my history of Discogs purchases is linked right at the top of my Shopping Cart page and in my Profile menu. Grazia!

Hey all,

Sorry if this has been answered/discussed. I know you can't block buyers with zero ratings. But I have a rather expensive item and I keep getting 'buyers' with no ratings on it and then they don't pay. This means the item isn't showing for sale anymore and it sits for 4 days until I cancel the order and relist. Is there a trick to stop this behavior? Even had one message me saying it was for their son who was having a baby and they were hoping I'd take $300 off lol. Just curious as to what someone gains by doing this over and over?

I’m new to the discogs world. I’m trying to scan all my records into my collection.

It looks like the only way other than searching to to scan the barcode. None of mine have barcodes. It would be cool if you could just can the cover and it find it.

I’ve got probably 400 records, so this may take awhile

Former Discogs employee here. I led Marketing at Discogs up until the end of 2025. I left Discogs, but I could see where things were heading... so I’m sharing in case anyone can help.

Over the last week or so, Discogs cut a significant part of its marketing and product teams. These are people who were improving the database/marketplace experience, doing the research behind feature decisions, keeping all of the systems running that collectors and sellers use every day. Most of you more than likely don't know them, but you've been a part of their work.

The job market is rough right now. I'm sure a lot of you either work in music or run/work at a business that leans on Discogs. If you're hiring, know someone who is, or can help, I went into more detail, including who's affected, on LinkedIn. I'll drop the link in the comments.

Hi, discogs newbie here, i have a question about ripping/digitizing very obscure and rare music.

In short i wanna listen to some 90s demo tapes but they aren't avaible to purchase and i couldn't find them anywhere (even on stuff like slsk). Is it "okay" to ask someone (politely ofc) that owns a copy to digitize/rip them? Or is it seen as rude.

I'm primarily a CD collector, but it feels like this applies to vinyl and tapes as well. I mostly fuck with underground black metal these days, and it feels like everything I take an interest in is going for a few dozen dollars a pop in the secondhand market, even for lesser-known projects in the genre. Barely two years ago, I was hesitant to drop even $30 USD on a used CD, but nowadays I get excited when an older, out-of-print album I'm interested in is going for $30 because that feels dirt cheap now. I'm not even talking about the original 90s Norwegian stuff; most of it is much younger and even more niche.

Maybe it's my fault for getting into underground stuff that has had limited runs, but since it's underground, that necessarily means there's also less demand for the things I'm interested in. So is it just me? Or is there something going on in the broader landscape that's driving up demand and prices?

I understand ratings are subjective and half the time I’m not sure what people are actually rating with a release. Is it a good press? Is it a cool release? Is it a good album? Who knows anymore.

Personally I’ve always rated the thing that matters being that it is music and there’s usually loads of different releases to pick from; how does it sound?

I’ve recently diversified my medium source and have been buying more cds but almost always, CD ratings are consistently lower than vinyl releases.

Why is this the case? Am I right in assuming it’s because most people’s CD players aren’t getting the best out of the medium and/or people are more likely to invest in a good vinyl set-up?

Thoughts?

I guess it’d be nice to know which master they use too and ratings could help there too.

Edit: clarified question.

Edit 2: added question.

Okay, so I received an order for an item that I sold on another site. No problem, I go in and cancel the order. However, the buyer still isn't refunded. I thought that was strange. I looked into it further and saw that there is a SEPERATE REFUND BUTTON that you have to hit BEFORE you hit cancel. Who would think this? If this were any site like eBay or Mercari, it would all be in one. But nope. So now I basically have to pay back the seller through the PayPal app (which I have to pay MY MONEY to cover the difference after the stupid fees they take). And then Discogs can't even verify if it went through since it is all private now. Why can't anything be easy on this site? It's the most frustrating user experience ever.

I've made around 60 purchases on Discogs. Every time I receive a CD, I leave the seller a positive rating. Unfortunately, only about half of the sellers reciprocate, so I currently have around 35 ratings.

The problem is that I recently had a terrible experience with a seller who was completely unresponsive. I had no choice but to leave him negative feedback based on my actual experience. Instead of accepting the feedback, the seller decided to retaliate by leaving me negative feedback in return. As a result, my buyer rating went from 100% down to 97.2%.

Yes, I know I can appeal the retaliatory feedback, but that process can take weeks, or even months?

A positive buyer rating is important as well. Many sellers have minimum rating requirements, and buyers with ratings below a certain threshold may not even be able to see or purchase some of the listings.

So please, take a minute to leave feedback for your buyers. Many of us take the time to rate you after every successful transaction, and that feedback matters to us too.