‘Phones ruined concerts’ is a common complaint most frequent gig goers will have heard, so you’d think a phone-free show would be met with huge applause.
However, when rumours emerged that Harry Styles might be banning phones at his one-night-only Manchester gig, some fans were up in arms.
The show was later confirmed to be phone-free, with the entire thing filmed by Netflix, but the Aperture singer exposed a serious divide among music fans.
Clearly, our feelings towards phones during live music events are a little less cut and dry, as our Metro readers very enthusiastically weighed in.
Some called it a ‘losing battle’ while one man said he’d ‘given up going to concerts’ entirely, sick of watching the gig through a stranger’s screen.
Others felt incredibly strongly that if they were coughing up hundreds to go to a gig, they were absolutely going to ‘record their own experiences’.
On her tour, Florence and the Machine features a moment during her biggest hit Dog Days Are Over where she stops and asks everyone to put away any devices.
The singer urges the crowd to live in the moment, unburdened by tech, and jump or dance to their hearts’ content.
That urge comes with the threat that she will call you out and point at you until you submit, with Florence freakishly good at spotting a camera in the crowd.
And the crowd obeys, watching everyone in an arena phone-free with their arms in the air is such a rare sight, you don’t even realise what you’re missing until you see it.
‘There’s nothing worse than a sea of phones’
Metro reader Steve P. Queen reasoned bans should ‘absolutely’ be put in place, telling fans to ‘live in the moment’ as there’s ‘nothing worse than a sea of phones.’
Chad Blake added: ‘All you see these days [are] phones everywhere and no dancing.’
Dr Roberta Katz previously told the New York Times how the fear of being ‘cringe’ (which includes dancing like nobody is watching) has made young people hesitant to try new things or let go.
‘There was gossip, there was bullying, but it was never at scale. Today, that behaviour and responses to behaviour can be at scale, so the significance of what happens changes,’ she explained.
The result? We’ve created our own surveillance state where even dancing at a concert could turn into widespread embarrassment.
On the flip side, if you’re the one filming, the potential for a clip to go viral so you can make money or even a career out of it is too tempting to ignore.
However, that need to hold your phone in the air for the best angle has a very real consequence — now you’re blocking other people.
‘People don’t use them in a discreet manner and thus block other people’s views,’ argued reader Ian Speed.
Warren James agreed: ‘Holding up your phone means your arms and phone are blocking [the] people stood behind you from being able to see the stage. The last gig I went to was pretty much a solid wall of people in front holding their phones up high enough to see over everyone else holding their phones up in the air.
‘It’s just sad! These days unless you’re right at the front crushed against the barrier, you barely have a chance of even seeing the stage through the sea of glowing phone screens surrounding you. It is a truly, truly awful experience.’
‘Phone lights during slow songs are beautiful’
Yet, Peter Glass argued it was all ‘part of making memories’ and if you’ve paid hundreds (or even thousands) to go to that gig, surely you have a right to film as much as you want.
Others voiced that they enjoyed the slow song moments where fans put their phone lights on and sway, with Debs Wright calling it ‘beautiful’.
In the old days (like the 90s), the crowd would hold up lighters during this or even an actual torch — removing phones might end up causing a fire hazard instead.
Realistically, this isn’t a new debate. In 2016, Alicia Keys had fans put their phones in sealed Yondr pouches, so they had to step outside and unlock the pouch to use them.
Yondr was started in 2012 as a direct response to founder Graham Dugoni’s experience at a festival, as he told the BBC: ‘I saw a man drunk and dancing and a stranger filmed him and immediately posted it online.’
‘It kind of shocked me,’ he shared. ‘I wondered what the implications might be for him, but I also started questioning what our expectations of privacy should be in the modern world.’
Calling phones a ‘crutch’, he said we could end up ‘undermining what it means to be a productive person’ if we’re always on our phones.
Yondr has worked with numerous artists to create phone-free environments, from Madonna to Childish Gambino.
‘People just need some self-control’
When an initially unconfirmed rumour — sparked by a random job listing — suggested his Manchester show would be phone-free, fans went into overdrive.
One TikTok from influencer Rachel Lord garnered almost 150k views overnight, with hundreds of comments saying they wouldn’t go phoneless.
Some cited the need to access medical information, others said Manchester was the wrong city to do this in, but many were just complaining that they wanted to film.
The initial outcry has been eased by the fact that the entire thing will be streamed on Netflix, airing Sunday, March 8 at 7pm.
Those who attended put their phones in thin plastic bags, still accessible but the camera was obscured – far less disastrous than having to lock your phone away.
Hopefully, fans attending the gig realised maybe it’s not so awful to put your phone away for an hour and disco with other dedicated fans.
Ultimately, unless you need a device on you for medical reasons, maybe the real plea isn’t for phone-free, it’s just for a little bit of self-control.
Let’s be honest, are you really going to re-watch it, or is it just clogging up your phone storage? Take some pictures or videos, but unless it’s your favourite song, maybe be a little more in the moment.
Our exception to this rule is reader Sally Buckby, who we think might just need new glasses as she wrote: ‘Tbh I see the artist better while recording & taking photos zooming in.’
A version of this article was first published on February 25, 2026.
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