Is The End Coming For Bluray?
When the Blu-ray player came on to the market a number of years ago many of us in this industry remarked, "this will be the shortest lived video format ever". What we meant by this was the evolution of video streaming will eventually knock the disc format out. Today with streaming services such as Netflix and Amazon Prime Video with content in 4K HDR this scenario is becoming more of a reality.
We saw a small resurgence of Blu-ray player activity with the introduction of 4K HDR models about 2 years ago. These players not only played the new 4K Blu-ray discs that arrived on the market but also played 4K streaming services such as the ones previously mentioned. However sales of these models quickly declined.
This brings me to my next point, Samsung has announced to dealers that they are officially exiting out of the Blu-ray business starting in 2019. With a major electronics manufacture making the exit we predict more will follow.
Last year we saw high end Blu-ray manufacture Oppo exit the business followed shortly after this one of our favourite pieces the Cambridge Audio CXUHD had cesed production as they required parts made by Oppo.
With all this happening if you are still a fan of the Blu-ray format, which many of us are, get yourself a good quality player before its too late.
1 comment
I think it’s too early to tell with any certainty. UHD Blu-Ray is now a thing, however, there’s definitely a slight shrinking of the demand because of the ubiquitous nature of streaming platforms plus original content only available on those respective services. I’ve talked to Sunrise Records and they told me sizeable portion of revenue still comes from the sale of movies and music on physical media such as Blu-Ray, DVD, and CD. I think Blu-Ray will be here for a considerable time because game consoles have had 1080p players for a long time. Whilst I still prefer the obvious quality difference with uncompressed audio and video on Blu-Ray, the majority of what I watch is on Netflix and Amazon Prime. I buy Blu-Ray for only movies and TV shows that are exceptional that I plan to rewatch over and over again.