US home entertainment grew 21% in 2024, discs down 23%

[SRW1000]

Full article:  US home entertainment grew 21% in 2024, discs down 23% - FlatpanelsHD

Here's the depressing part:

Disc sales drop below $1 billion

For the first time, sales of physical discs – DVD, Blu-ray, and UHD Blu-ray – dropped below the $1 billion mark in the US after a 23.4% year-over-year decline, down from over $16 billion at the peak in 2005.

Sales of DVD, Blu-ray and UHD Blu-ray discs all declined in 2024. While UHD Blu-ray is indeed capturing a growing share of a rapidly shrinking disc market, sales of UHD Blu-ray discs have declined almost every year since 2018, as shown in the graph by FlatpanelsHD contributor Yoeri Geutskens on his Ultra HD Blu-ray feed on X.

US home entertainment grew 21% in 2024, discs down 23%

[Barry]

Great, thanks for posting.

BUT
could some of this decline come from the lack of new movies from 2020-4. COVID and the strike. Maybe this year when movies pick up, sales of discs will go up somewhat too. of course we know that streaming affects this too. So the studios may not be losing that much money it’s just coming from a different place.

[SRW1000]

Great, thanks for posting.

BUT
could some of this decline come from the lack of new movies from 2020-4. COVID and the strike. Maybe this year when movies pick up, sales of discs will go up somewhat too. of course we know that streaming affects this too. So the studios may not be losing that much money it’s just coming from a different place.

While I don't disagree that the lower amount of content due to Covid and the strikes reduced the total number of titles, I think the overall trend line of the decline shows the heart of the problem.

Yes, streaming is taking a toll.  Especially considering how many of those titles never make it to physical media.  I guess we should still just buy the stuff we want while we can.  At some point, it may only be boutique releases that make it to disc, similar to LPs today.

[Barry]

You’re probably right.

of course, they said that about records.

[Paul Heroy]

While I don't disagree that the lower amount of content due to Covid and the strikes reduced the total number of titles, I think the overall trend line of the decline shows the heart of the problem.

Yes, streaming is taking a toll.  Especially considering how many of those titles never make it to physical media.  I guess we should still just buy the stuff we want while we can.  At some point, it may only be boutique releases that make it to disc, similar to LPs today.

Well the thing is, it's become a lot easier AFAIK to do a small run of LPs (500-3000, say) than a small run of 4K UHD BDs. There are quite a few non mainstream music artists who have jumped on the vinyl train, releasing custom colors and other limited edition type LPs that collector fans snap up. (I, er, might have a handful or two.) Maybe discs for movies become more the realm of indy filmmakers. But I think the major studios who are more $ driven like the control & data afforded by streaming and are very, very happy to continue moving things that direction.

[David Vaughn]

Not having the movies in Best Buy and Target is a huge loss. You lose the impulse buys that people make when they see a movie that they've always have wanted to watch or had previously seen and had fond memories of it. Sadly, movie buying is going to be a niche industry sooner than we'd all like to see.