Blu-ray outsells HD DVD 2 to 1 in first half of 2007
Both Blu-ray and HD DVD promotional groups have been advertising and touting minor victories here and there throughout 2007. We have seen numerous press releases from both camps touting disc sales numbers, standalone hardware sales statistics and more. These press releases generally talk percentages and in the HD DVD group’s case, they conveniently leave out the Sony PS3 console when they flaunt HD DVD player sales numbers.
With all the percentages and ratios flying around, it is nice to finally see some hard numbers on disc sales, now available to the public.
Home Media Magazine’s research division (Home Media Research) has recently reported that sales of Blu-ray Discs hit 1.6 million compared to 795,000 HD DVD’s sold in the first half of 2007 (Jan – Jun). Adding these up, you can see that approximately 2.4 million high definition discs were sold in the first half of 2007, with Blu-ray Disc sales accounting for over 66% of all these sales.
Blu-ray and HD DVD units sold since inception
The units sold since format inception are a bit different though. HD DVD has an advantage in this statistic as the format hit the market a bit before Blu-ray, resulting in a longer window of sales periods for HD DVD. According to Home Media Research, an estimated 3.7 million high def discs have been sold since the inception of both formats, with Blu-ray taking 2.2 million of that share and HD-DVD taking 1.5 million (data collected through the end of July).
The overall home video market
While these high definition disc sales numbers are slowly creeping into the millions, it is not much compared to the overall DVD sales market. DVD unit sales are in the billions and most analysts have determined that the high definition disc market is sitting at a mere 1-4% of the overall home video market. This means that there is plenty of room to grow for both formats.
The format war will continue…
At this point in time, HD DVD certainly seems to be the struggling format, with lower overall disc unit sales, less studio support and less retailer support than Blu-ray Disc. Nonetheless, the format war will probably continue on for quite some time. Possibly long enough to herald in the introduction of low cost dual format Blu-ray/HD DVD players, which would make the whole war a bit moot. These disc sales numbers were first reported on Reuters.
I may see a pattern now that Blu-Ray will rise and take the #1 place. 🙂
HD-DVD only have Universal Studios as a support and the
other movie industries choose the magic Blu-Ray. So
I guess Universal sooner or later are gonna have to choose Blu-Ray if they want to reach the costumers.
This “war” between these to formats is a big mess itself. Could you imagine two different DVD formats. I guess if this would had happend in the past we still would use the floppy disk.