Cassette pioneers, MiniDisc recorders and gold-plated hi-res players share one bracket here. Pick the one that earned its place in your pocket.
1Walkman TPS-L2The original 1979 Sony cassette Walkman, launched in Japan on July 1, 1979 at 33,000 yen with two headphone jacks and a 'hotline' talk button.1000pts
2Walkman WM-2The 1981 second-generation cassette Walkman, smaller and lighter than the original, which reached one million sales within about nine months of launch.622pts
3MD Walkman MZ-R55A 1998 MiniDisc recorder that Sony billed as the world's smallest MD recorder, measuring about 84 by 79 by 19 mm.551pts
4Walkman NW-WM1ZThe gold-plated 256 GB Signature Series player unveiled at IFA 2016, with a copper chassis and a balanced 4.4 mm output.551pts
5Walkman NW-A105A 2019 A Series high-resolution player that brought Android, streaming apps and a 3.6-inch touchscreen to Sony's mid-range Walkman.551pts
6Sports Walkman WM-F5The first Sports Walkman, introduced in 1983 with a rubber-sealed, splash-resistant yellow body and a built-in FM radio.466pts
7Walkman Professional WM-D6CA 1984 portable cassette recorder in Sony's Walkman Professional line that added Dolby C noise reduction to the earlier WM-D6, built for recording on location.466pts
8Network Walkman NW-HD1Announced in June 2004, the first hard-disk Walkman, holding 20 GB and priced at $399.466pts
9Walkman NWZ-X1050A 2009 X Series player (sold as the NW-X1050 in Japan) with a 3-inch OLED touchscreen, built-in Wi-Fi and digital noise cancelling.466pts
10MD Walkman MZ-E10Sony's 2002 tenth-anniversary MiniDisc player, a playback-only model weighing about 55 g.363pts
11Walkman NW-ZX1The December 2013 debut of the high-resolution ZX Series, an Android player with a 4-inch screen and a digital amplifier.363pts
12Walkman NW-ZX707A 2023 ZX Series high-resolution player running Android 12 with a 5-inch 720p screen and 64 GB of storage.363pts
13Network Walkman NW-MS7Sony's first solid-state Walkman, released in Japan on December 21, 1999, storing ATRAC3 music on a Memory Stick.363pts
14Walkman WM-701CA slim late-1980s auto-reverse cassette Walkman with Dolby B and C noise reduction and a remote control, the model Sony used as the basis for its 1989 10th-anniversary WM-701S.362pts
15MD Walkman MZ-N1A 2001 MiniDisc Walkman that launched Sony's Net MD format, letting music be transferred from a PC over USB.0pts
16MD Walkman MZ-RH1A 2006 Hi-MD recorder that was the first MiniDisc Walkman able to upload recordings from standard MiniDiscs to a PC; production ended in 2011.0pts
17MD Walkman MZ-1Released in 1992 alongside the MZ-2P player, this was Sony's first MiniDisc Walkman and could record as well as play.0pts
18Walkman NW-WM1ZM2The 2022 successor to the gold Signature Series Walkman, moving it to Android and USB-C.0pts
Photo credits
- MD Walkman MZ-R55 — Tom Page, CC BY-SA 2.0
- Walkman NW-A105 — Alex Ma, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Walkman NWZ-X1050 — kodamatyy, CC BY-SA 3.0
- MD Walkman MZ-RH1 — Esteban García González, CC BY-SA 4.0
