There are plenty of reasons to collect vinyl: the joy of digging through crates at your local shop, album art actually big enough to admire, the sound of the needle pressing down on the disc, the chance to support artists with more than a fraction of a cent, and the sheer tactility of owning a piece of art in a time of subscription-based living. That sleeve holds a magical disc but also a story: where you found it, what you were doing that day, why it had to come home with you.
Crater is for the people who don't just love collecting, but also curating, discovering, sharing, and reliving. I started this because I wanted a better way to catalog my growing collection than a spreadsheet, or worse, my brain. I looked around and couldn't find anything that looked or felt like what I had in my head. Discogs is good at what it does, but it's ultimately a marketplace built for buying, selling, and grading, not for actually living with a collection you already own. I wanted something that gave my records more context than a simple inventory ever could.
So I built it: a proper digital home for a very analog collection. I knew getting started would have to be simple. I started by taking a couple photos of my collection and letting the app do the rest, a process that took a little longer than it hopefully takes others now that I've refined it a bit. I then added the things I wanted to help me organize and curate my collection for certain moments or vibes, track the journey of my collection, and find inspiration to keep adding to it.
Once it all worked, I had two thoughts. One: other collectors might have felt similarly and would want this too. Two: I really hoped they did, because digging through your own crate is fun, but sharing what you find is even better. Think of a time you put a friend onto an album or artist they ended up loving, or vice versa — is that not one of the best feelings ever?
I hope you like crater and get some real use out of it. My plan is to keep building on it and improving. If you've got feedback, ideas, a feature request, or a record store I should know about, email me at sreekar@cratervinyl.com. Happy crating!
Since it's a fair thing to wonder about: I use LLMs to help build and maintain crater, and to power DJ Mode, Recommendations, and Taste Analysis. All three only ever read your own collection back to you — matching a vibe you want to records you already own, spotting a gap, noticing a pattern in your taste — but never anyone else's shelf, and never anything invented. Crater will never use AI to generate cover art, write reviews, or (🤢) make music.