CEX price history: see what your stock is doing
CEX shows today's price and nothing else. If you hold hundreds of discs or games, the question that actually pays is what changed since last time — which is what Pricesweep records when you re-price a saved list.
What this is and isn't. Pricesweep tracks the items on your list, from the first time you price them. It is not a public archive of every CEX product going back years. If you want the price history of one specific disc you have never owned, CeXDB does that and does it well. What follows is for people with stock to watch.
Why CEX prices move, and why it matters unevenly
CEX repricing is not gentle. An ordinary DVD will sit at the same few pence for months on end. A box set that goes out of print, or a game that gets a sudden revival, can move by pounds in a fortnight. The movement is concentrated in a small fraction of any collection, which is precisely why watching it by hand doesn't work: you cannot re-check 9,000 barcodes on the off-chance, and the thirty that moved are the only ones you wanted.
How tracking works here
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Price your list once
Upload a spreadsheet of barcodes. Every one is matched against CEX and the result is kept against your account.
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Re-price it whenever you like
One click, no re-uploading. Adding the week's new stock is a small file of just the new barcodes.
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Sort by what moved
Each row carries its previous cash price and the difference. Sort by biggest riser, or filter to just the ones that went up, and you have a short list of things now worth selling.
What a change column looks like
Sorted by movement rather than value, so a disc that doubled from £2 shows up next to one that added £10.
| Barcode | Title | Cash | Was | Change | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5051892235211 | Harry Potter Complete Steelbook Col. (12) 4K UHD+BR | £156.00 | £142.00 | +£14.00 | On CEX |
| 5051561002427 | Doctor Who: Complete Box Set 1-7 | £55.00 | £48.00 | +£7.00 | On CEX |
| 5039036082228 | 007, James Bond Col. (15) (24 Movies) 24 Disc | £22.00 | £19.50 | +£2.50 | On CEX |
| 5051892189859 | Wire, The - Complete Season 1-5 (18) | £19.00 | £21.00 | −£2.00 | On CEX |
A representation of the change column after a re-price. Cash prices are real CEX figures; the "was" column illustrates movement between runs.
The trap in reading CEX history literally
A price that falls to zero usually hasn't. When a disc gets a new barcode, CEX renames the old record to point at the replacement and sets its prices to zero rather than deleting it. On a list built up over years there will be a fair number, and any naive comparison reads them as a total collapse in value. Pricesweep spots them, follows the replacement, and compares against that instead, so your risers and fallers are real.
What it won't tell you
- Anything before your first run. There is no back catalogue of CEX prices here. Tracking starts when you start.
- Why a price moved. You get the movement, not the reason. A reprint, a delisting and a sudden bit of attention all look identical in the numbers.
- What CEX will do next. Past movement is not a forecast, and anyone selling you one is guessing.
Questions
Does CEX publish price history?
No. CEX shows you today's price and nothing about what it was last month, so there is no official history to look up. Anything you find is a third party that has been recording the prices over time.
Can I see the price history of a single item?
Not here, and it is worth saying so plainly. Pricesweep tracks the items on your own list, not every product in the catalogue, so it can tell you what has happened to your stock but not what a disc you have never owned did last year. CeXDB is the site that does public per-item history, and it is good at it.
How does tracking my own list work?
You upload your barcodes once. Pricesweep prices them against CEX and keeps the result. Next time you re-price, every row carries its previous cash price and the difference, so you can sort by biggest riser and see what has become worth selling.
How often do CEX prices actually change?
Often enough to matter on anything scarce, and barely at all on the long tail. A common DVD sits at the same few pence for months. A box set that goes out of print can move by pounds. That asymmetry is the argument for tracking: the interesting movement is concentrated in a small part of any collection.
Why did an item's price drop to zero?
Usually it hasn't. CEX retires a barcode by pointing the old record at a replacement barcode for the same disc and zeroing the old one's prices, rather than deleting it. Read literally that looks like a collapse in value. Pricesweep follows the replacement and prices that instead.
Do I need a paid plan?
Saving a list and re-pricing it is part of Power Seller, because it is built for people with hundreds or thousands of items. Checking a single item's price today is free for the first 10 each month, with no signup.
How far back does the history go?
From your first run. Pricesweep has no archive of CEX prices from before you started tracking, and it would be dishonest to imply otherwise. The comparison you get is between your runs.
Start the clock
Price your list once and every re-price from then on tells you what moved.