GuidesUpdated By Federico Ragusa
How much is a used vinyl record worth? Look at what other sellers ask
A used vinyl record is worth roughly what other sellers ask today for the same pressing, in the same condition, with postage included. There is no list price to go by.
The work is in comparing like with like: the right pressing, graded the same way, from sellers who post to you. One listing priced far too high or too low tells you very little on its own.
First: which record is it, exactly
The same album exists in dozens of pressings: the first, the reissues, the editions for each country, the 180-gram ones, the coloured ones, the ones that came with a magazine. They have different prices, sometimes very different. A listing that gives only the title compares everything with everything, and the average that comes out of it is right for no pressing in particular.
You read the pressing on the record itself. The catalogue number is on the back of the sleeve and on the label; the numbers etched in the run-out groove, between the last track and the label, say which pressing it is. With those two you can find the exact pressing on Discogs and know what you are comparing; without them you are guessing.
Condition: disc and sleeve, graded separately
Record sellers use a scale, the Goldmine one: Mint, Near Mint, Very Good Plus, Very Good, Good. The disc gets one grade and the sleeve another, and a serious listing states both. "Great condition" without a grade says nothing: ask for the grade, or for a photo of the disc tilted towards a lamp, where the scratches show.
The price can change a lot between a Very Good and a Near Mint copy of the same record, because a Near Mint plays like new and you can hear a Very Good. That is what the scale is for: so nobody pays a Near Mint price for a Very Good record.
- Scratches you can feel with a fingernail: you will hear them too.
- A warped disc: it skips, or the arm sways.
- Surface noise: cleaning helps, but it does not always go away.
- Sleeve: corners, spine, writing, stickers, seam splits.
- Original inner sleeve, inserts, poster: they are part of the record.
Where to look at prices
Discogs is the collectors' reference: for each pressing it shows the copies for sale and, more usefully, the history of sales that went through. eBay has the live listings and, with a filter, the sold ones, which tell you more. Classifieds sites and Vinted have plenty of listings from people clearing out a loft, often with no pressing and no grade: low prices, but read them carefully. Shops ask more and, in return, have looked at the record.
The asking price is not the price paid. A listing that has sat at a high price for six months is a wish. That is why completed sales count for more than asking prices, and a range built from many offers tells you more than one listing does.
How to read the price range
Take the offers for the same pressing, in the same condition, and add postage to each price. Drop the sellers who do not post to you. What is left is a range: what other sellers ask today. An offer inside the range is normal; one below it is a good deal, if the condition is as described; one above it is one to leave, or to haggle over.
Used vinyl prices, record by record
The typical price sits in the middle: for each record, half the sellers ask less and half ask more, delivery included. We only count offers that compare: same condition, delivery stated. We read the offers again several times a day, and the table is worked out again every hour. Prices read on 28 October 2026.
| Record | Typical price | Lowest | Compared |
|---|---|---|---|
| Beatles Sgt Pepper LP | £68 | £9.25 | 186 |
| Queen A Night at the Opera · Lp | £54 | £18 | 112 |
| Miles Davis Kind of Blue · Lp | £79 | £15.52 | 58 |
| Bob Marley & the Wailers Legend · Lp | £35 | £16.95 | 39 |
| Kraftwerk Autobahn · Lp · 1974 | £35 | £19.09 | 13 |
| Michael Jackson Thriller LP | £25 | £16.32 | 12 |
| Dire Straits Brothers in Arms LP | £25 | £13.74 | 10 |
| Bob Marley & The Wailers The Birth of a Legend · Lp | £27 | £15 | 7 |
| Bob Marley and the Wailers Legend · Lp · 1984 | £25 | £16 | 7 |
The mistakes that get the price wrong
Buying or selling, the same ones come up again and again.
- Comparing different pressings of the same album.
- Ignoring postage: a record at £20 plus £9 postage costs more than one at £26 with postage included.
- Taking the highest asking price as the "value" of the record.
- Trusting "rare" in the title: the seller is the one saying it.
- Counting a seller who does not post to where you are.
- Grading the condition without having played the record.
If you are the one selling
Put the pressing and both grades in the listing, and in the title if there is room. Photos: sleeve front and back, label, the run-out groove if you can, the disc tilted to the light. Ask a price inside the range others ask for the same pressing, not above it: above it nobody buys, and every week it sits there, the person who wanted it may be buying elsewhere.
Where: Discogs if the record interests collectors and you have patience; Vinted, eBay or your country's classifieds site if you want to sell it quickly to someone who wants to play it. State postage separately and clearly, and send it tracked.
What NotDone does
NotDone reads the record's listing, recognises the pressing when it is stated, compares the offers of other sellers for the same record with postage included and tells you whether to buy, sell, keep or wait. If there are too few offers to give a range, it says so instead of inventing one. The app is not out yet; the comparison of offers is already on this site, model by model.
Is an old record always worth something?
No. Many records from the seventies and eighties were pressed in the hundreds of thousands and are worth a few pounds even in good condition. What counts is the pressing, the demand and the condition, not the age.
Is the Discogs price the right one?
It is the best place to start, because for each pressing it shows the sales that actually happened, not just the asking prices. But it is a collectors' market: buyers on a classifieds site or on Vinted often pay less, and sellers there often do not state the pressing.
What matters more, the disc or the sleeve?
It depends on the record. For most records the disc counts, because people buy them to play. For sought-after pressings a damaged sleeve weighs almost as much as a scratched disc, because the people looking for them want the whole thing.
How do I post a record?
Take the disc out of the sleeve, put it in an inner sleeve and pack it beside the sleeve, so a knock cannot split the sleeve from the inside. Use stiff cardboard on both sides, never a padded envelope on its own, and send it tracked: a lost record cannot be replaced with an identical one.