Discogs (short for "discographies") is a crowd-sourced music database and marketplace founded in 2000. It catalogs virtually every known music release across all formats — vinyl, CD, cassette, digital — with detailed information including track listings, credits, catalog numbers, matrix information, and pressing details. With over 16 million releases cataloged and 8 million items for sale, it's the essential tool for music collectors.
The Discogs marketplace connects buyers and sellers worldwide, with built-in seller ratings, grading standards, and price history for every release. You can see the median price, highest price, and lowest price for any specific pressing — making it invaluable for determining fair market value. Sellers grade using the Goldmine standard, and Discogs' dispute resolution system provides buyer protection.
For collectors, Discogs serves multiple purposes: cataloging your own collection (with automatic value estimates), discovering which pressings of an album exist, researching dead wax matrix numbers to identify your pressing, and buying/selling records globally. The "wantlist" feature alerts you when items you're looking for become available. If you're building a vinyl or CD collection, a Discogs account is essential — think of it as the Spotify of physical music, except for ownership data rather than streaming.
Discogs users have collectively cataloged over 16 million releases and 8 million artists. The database grows by thousands of new entries every day, entirely maintained by volunteers.