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Sony and Panasonic unveil the next generation of Blu-ray

Published Mar 10th, 2014 6:15PM EDT
Sony Panasonic Archival Disc

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The DVD market is still alive and kicking, but Sony and Panasonic have already revealed the next-gen follow-up to Blu-ray Disc. The new format, dubbed Archival Disc, will allow for optical discs with storage capacities of up to 300GB, a six-fold increase over current dual layer Blu-ray Discs. As time goes on, Sony and Panasonic plan to expand the recording capacity to 500GB and eventually 1 terabyte. With a terabyte of data on a single disc, 4K suddenly becomes a viable option for home video releases. According to the press release, Sony and Panasonic plan to launch the first Archival Disc systems in summer of 2015. What this means for DVD, Blu-ray and the new game consoles remains to be seen, but with the stated goal of “expanding the market for long-term digital data storage,” we might see the proliferation of three separate formats next year.

Jacob Siegal
Jacob Siegal Associate Editor

Jacob Siegal is Associate Editor at BGR, having joined the news team in 2013. He has over a decade of professional writing and editing experience, and helps to lead our technology and entertainment product launch and movie release coverage.