Gen Z birding boom: How teens turned grandma’s pastime into a nationwide analog craze

Ian Bell was 15 when he first roamed Central Park with binoculars, the lone teenager in a sea of older birders. “I remember starting birding and being very lonely,” he told Reuters. “I had no one to bird with who wasn’t 20 years older than me.”

Gen Z birding takes flight

Five years later Bell co‑hosts a Discord server of 4,400 members who ping each other about sightings, a micro‑indicator of a surge that shows up at Cornell’s now‑packed birding club and in federal surveys reporting that participation among 25‑to‑34‑year‑olds has ↑ 400% since 2016.

The analog revival aligns with a broader screen‑fatigue wave that followed the pandemic, yet technology has been a catalyst. Merlin, Cornell Lab’s free identification app, grew from 279,000 U.S. users in July 2019 to ↑ 4.8 million in July 2026, pulling novices into the field via the eBird database.

“Bird watching used to be a niche thing, and now it’s a cool thing,” said Christopher Wood, director of eBird, to Bloomberg.

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College campuses echo the shift: National Audubon’s chapters jumped from zero to 117 in six years, and its social feeds report a “surge in supporters in their 20s and 30s.”

Yet most newcomers don’t cite a specific feathered muse. Shawn Wallace, 22, fell in after a resident advisor urged him to locate a tufted duck. “We spent hours searching, didn’t find it, but I kept going,” he said. Psychologist Jennifer Lodi‑Smith, who catalogued 600 origin stories, found two‑thirds are about people, not birds: “I have spark people,” she told Fortune.

Veteran birder Robert Buckert describes the community as a “giving, mentor‑rich environment” that welcomes youth. “When you’re taken under a wing, literally, you get swept in,” he explained. Wallace now pays it forward, nudging friends to install Merlin or set up feeders.

Words by Camilla Dupont (Luxury Markets & Lifestyle Editor).