Sony has discontinued its last UHD Blu-ray player in Japan. The UBP-X700 is out of stock on the Sony Japan online store, whose product listing now says "Out of stock. This item will not be restocked."
According to the Japanese Sony retailer and blog Kuntoku, as reported by FlatpanelsHD, sales in Japan end as of today, 22nd October.
As we said in our Sony UBP-X700 review, it's a brilliant budget player (in our view, the top budget player among the best 4K Blu-ray players) — so if you've been thinking about getting one, it might be wise to move quickly. Although there has not been any official announcement, if Sony no longer sells its sole dedicated 4K player in Japan, that doesn't look good for other markets.
I've checked big-name retailers and Sony's US and UK websites, and all of them currently have stock.
Is the end of the optical disc in sight?
If the player is discontinued elsewhere and you still want a 4K Blu-ray device from Sony you can buy a PlayStation 5 or a PS5 Slim. But even the best PS5 deals involve spending roughly twice what you'd pay for the UBP-X700, and the PS5 doesn't support Dolby Vision, HDR10+, or Dolby Atmos and DTS decoding for movies.
The discontinuation doesn't bode well for the PS6 either. Sony hasn't said the optical disc is fully dead in its future consoles, but if you take this alongside Sony's controversial plans to stop selling game discs and the lack of an optical drive as standard in the PS5 Pro it doesn't suggest a bright Blu-ray future for the next-next-gen console. And if you think the PS5 is pricey, the PS6 is likely to be significantly more expensive.
We've been reporting on Blu-ray since its debut two decades ago, and with manufacturers' interest in the format waning there's no sign of another format to replace it. As we said in our investigation into the future of 4K Blu-ray: "A successor wouldn't just need a better disc, there’d have to be a need to even build that better disc in the first place. Only then would studios create the content, manufacturers would build the players, TV makers would support it and consumers would decide if it was worth upgrading. But right now none of the experts could identify a good enough reason."
I don't think Blu-ray discs are dead — in fact, they're seeing a resurgence — but the players seem to be looking a little sick these days. so if you're keen to stick with optical media it would be wise to pick up one of the best Blu-ray players while you still can, even despite the recent price hikes to Panasonic's players.
I suspect that we'll see the movie market move to something similar to what we've seen in audio: ok-quality streaming subs for the mass market and very hi-res buy-to-own downloads for cinephiles with deeper pockets.