Hey there!
I am doing a project where I need to hook up 5 or more distance sensors to a Raspberry Pi.
One possible way of doing this would be to get a qwiic phat, a mux and some sensors.
But which ones?
I need the readable distance to be at least in the 1-12cm range. A higher range is fine too, but the minimum range should be at most 1cm.
I had thought of using the “SparkFun Proximity Sensor Breakout - 20cm, VCNL4040 (Qwiic)” but it seems like it is digital only? Unfortunately I need the distance readings. 
Any suggestions?
The VCNL4040 is probably the best choice for your project.
Pretty much any sensor you find now a days is going to be digital, especially ones with the precision you’re looking for. Start with one sensor, get that running well then add a mux, get that working with one sensor and from there you can start adding more.
But is it possible to measure distance using the VCNL4040?
Good point, I thought these would return a distance, not a proximity value. You might be able to roughly translate that value into a distance but if you’re looking for accurate measurements, the VL53L1X is probably the way to go. It has a minimum measurement of 4cm though, if your setup allows you might need to mount it 5cm back from your ‘zero’ point and then remember a reading of 5 is really 1cm.