Listening to music is easier than ever — you have hundreds of thousands of songs at your fingertips, plus, algorithms, custom playlists, pre-saves and more make the process feel automated.
asserted
process → listen → fingertips
However, that doesn’t mean we’re ready to give up on physical media.
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we → mean → media
A 2025 Consumer Reports study found that almost half of Americans (45%) still listen to CDs, with one in five still listening to vinyl records.
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one → find → records
The Lola CD player is designed to help bring that nostalgic feel back to your music, and myself, along with three other NBC Selected editors, tested it for two weeks.
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myself → design → weeks
We collectively agree that it’s a fun way to switch up our listening habits (and a very cute accessory to carry around), however, it may not be best for people most concerned with convenience.
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it → agree → convenience
What to know about the Lola Portable CD Player
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know → know → Player
The Lola CD player is a classic portable player with a few modern updates, including anti-skip protection and a micro SD card slot.
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player → include → protection
It charges via an included USB-C cable, so you can share a charger with your phone if needed.
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you → charge → phone
While the player doesn’t have Bluetooth capabilities, it has a 3.5mm headphone jack, and can be paired with a Bluetooth device with a third-party adapter, according to the brand.
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it → have → brand
It also comes with a pair of polka dot, wired headphones, and gets up to 48 hours of playback on a single charge.
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It → come → charge
How we tested it
Four NBC Selected editors, myself included, tested courtesy samples for around two weeks, using it as a substitute for streaming music.
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myself → test → music
We listened on commutes, on walks and throughout the day to see how the listening experience measured up.
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experience → listen → day
Since a few of us belong to different generations, we all have a range of experiences with physical media, helping to shape each of our unique perspectives on using the CD player.
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we → belong → player
While I’ve owned boomboxes and CD players in the past, two of our editors grew up listening to CDs, which made this testing process especially interesting for them.
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process → own → them
“I’m in my late 30s, and grew up recording songs off the radio onto cassette tapes and listening to them on my Walkman,” says NBC Selected senior editor Nikki Brown.
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Brown → ’m → Walkman
“I eventually graduated to CDs, most of which I still have today — and of course I took my CD player everywhere,” she says.
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she → graduate → player
NBC Selected senior editor Shalwah Evans had a similar experience — “I’m a Xennial, so I had a Discman in high school and remember burning mixtapes in college,” she says.
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she → have → college
“I praised the day the iPod dropped and changed the way we listened to music”.
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we → praise → music
NBC Selected editorial operations associate (and Gen-Z-er) Jem Alabi, on the other hand, specifically likes buying physical versions of her favorite K-pop albums, but hasn’t had anything to play them on until now.
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Alabi → like → them
“I have quite a few CD’s that have been collecting dust,” she says.
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she → have → dust
“The CD’s tend to have bonus tracks that you can’t always find on streaming so I was happy to get to hear my favorite groups in this intimate way.
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I → tend → way
Along with seeing how well the CD player works in comparison to streaming, we also evaluated features like the battery life and the player’s anti-skip protection.
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we → see → life
What we liked
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liked → like → What
In our experience, the Lola CD player is worth it for anyone looking to invest more in physical media, or who may be searching for a more intimate and intentional music listening experience than streaming can offer.
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streaming → look → experience
We also like the anti-skip protection and battery life.
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We → like → protection
While those features work well, we felt as though our experiences with the headphones were mixed, and that the CD player, while cute, isn’t very convenient to carry around.
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player → work → headphones
An intentional way to connect with music
The Lola CD player definitely feels like a throwback to a simpler time — pre-streaming and algorithms, when your listening experience felt a lot more personal and manual.
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experience → connect → time
I especially felt this during the time when I’d choose my CDs for the day — I usually chose one to start with inside the player, and then one more to bring along for variety.
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I → feel → variety
Choosing the CD every morning felt like I was curating my mood for the day, which added an intentionality to my music listening that isn’t always there with streaming.
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that → choose → streaming
“Using this CD player felt like stepping into a time machine,” says Brown.
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Brown → use → machine
“I pulled out my CD case and immediately was transported to all that was happening in my life when I made or bought each one — the people I was spending time with, the city I lived in, the party I pregamed for, the person I was dating.”
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I → pull → time
She also turned it into a communal experience: “I started sending pictures of CDs to my group chat and we went down rabbit holes seeing what certain singers and musicians were up to since we last listened to them.”
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we → turn → them
she says.
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she → say → ?
Evans felt similarly, saying that using the CD player shifted her daily listening habits from single songs to full albums.
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using → feel → albums
“I also rediscovered songs that I loved and hadn’t heard in forever because I rarely play full albums all the way out (versus spot-playing songs from different albums),” she says.
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she → rediscover → albums
Alabi, who grew up listening to Afrobeat CDs with her family, also felt that the CD player helped her reconnect with those memories: “My family has a vast Afrobeat CD collection with songs that marked my childhood but can’t be found on streaming, so it was cool to have a way to preserve and revive those memories,” she says.
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she → grow → memories
That’s also something I loved about the CD player — it let me finally put so many of my old CDs to use while on-the-go, instead of letting them collect dust on my shelves (and made me look forward to picking up some new ones, too).
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me → ’ → ones
Surprisingly, no skips (for the most part)
Prior to testing, one of Evans’ biggest concerns was whether or not the player would skip, or damage her CDs.
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player → skip → CDs
Thankfully, the device’s anti-skip protection did its job well, which she calls “a huge plus”.
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she → do → which
She was also reminded that since the music didn’t rely on a Wi-Fi connection, there were no service outages.
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music → remind → connection
…and 33 more, not listed.
The Aporia
