Streaming took a big bite out of the market, but it didn't quite "put an end" to physical as DVD and Blu Ray remain in production and on shelves, they're just not as ubiquitous as they were in the 2000s.

True, but blu-ray was on its way to become mass market like DVD, then streaming hit and blu-ray prices went up, becoming the premium enthusiast format. They're still there but the days of cheap new releases and good remasters on blu-ray are gone. Also blu-ray players have gone up in price. Nvm 4K blu-ray being even more expensive and even less available.

The decline is stabilizing now but it's about a 93% to 94% drop from the 2005 peak!

Blu-ray was supposed to become to standard format and 4K bluray the premium version, but instead it's premium and ultra premium. It's amazing how a 1996 format is still the dominant (physical) home format in 2026! 480p while our screens are 2160p. 

My uncle invested in a large DVD library (over 1'000 I guess), because he thought that this is the best solution for movies we would ever get (and it's a massive upgrade coming from VHS). When we then got the Blu-ray only a few years later, he completely stopped buying any movie, because he felt fooled.

I think Blu-ray came at least 10 years too early. Probably my uncle wasn't the only one who got frustrated that a medium has become obsolete just a few years later.

I agree that Blu-ray launched too early, especially how heavily it was pushed. It was included in every PS3, marketed on tons of DVD previews, and received a lot of titles. The early players were bulky, too. That to me was one of the biggest reasons they came out too quickly. Also, look at TVs. 720p TVs were catching on in 2006, but 1080p TVs were mostly still a luxury. 

It's important to note that VHS and other formats were out a lot earlier than people think. VHS launched in 1976 in Japan (the year after Betamax launched) but didn't become common in most middle-class homes in major markets until around 1984-1985. Throughout the 1980s, people would often rent VCRs along with the tapes because they often had only one player in their house or none at all. 

DVD didn't become mainstream until around 2000 as PS2 launched and didn't become massive until around 2002-2003. 

I do disagree with you that Blu-ray launched at least 10 years too early. By 2016, 1080p video was already common on streaming services. I think the streaming services still would have chased that even without discs that went above 480p.

2010-2011 probably would've been a great time to launch Blu-ray. But then that leaves the issue of UHD Blu-ray launching too early (2016-2019) or too late (2021 or later). 

This all goes back to that in most situation DVD was going to be the final piece of physical media for video that surpassed a previous format. No disc, SD card or such would be able to contend fully with the popularity of streaming. 

Wow to this day I don't think I've ever even seen an actual legit copy of a DVD movie. During its peak days piracy in my country was crazy, we had stores EVERYWHERE selling $1 copies of new releases. Granted most of them were shitty quality stuff recorded from the cinema but apparently it was a good business before streaming took over. Retailers probably didn't even bother to bring legal stuff.

As an outsider looking in (assuming you're still in El Salvador), it looks like DVD took until the late 2000s there to surpass VHS. I just looked that Blu-rays are technically available sometimes in El Salvador from shops and sellers but as indirect imports. If you've never seen an official DVD copy there, you've probably never seen a Blu-ray copy of a movie either.

In the USA, I've mostly seen pirated movies at conventions or thrift/charity stores. You don't really ever see them in my area going into entertainment stores or general stores.

Blu Ray likely arrived when it did cos they wanted to catch the HDTV wave, as DVDs couldn't really take full advantage of this boom with their limited 480p.

It's telling though that Blu Ray did not manage to fully displace DVD, and in fact 20 years later, DVD is still going.

Blu-ray wasn't quite ready for release yet, but the race with HD-DVD forced its hand. Sony wanted to prevent another long drawn out format war. Hence very expensive early players and early mpgeg-2 discs, h.264 pipeline wasn't ready yet either. In 2007 everything was ready and 1080p TVs were already on the market in 2006. I got my first 52" 1080p LCD tv when Gears of War released in 2007.

Anyway quality is not why the mainstream chooses a format, DVD was much easier to handle than VHS, Streaming easier again. S-VHS, LaserDisc, Blu-ray were all higher quality with less convenience (more expensive players, less availability) 

Records and CDs are also still going. The 'modern' vinyl record hasn't changed since 1948!

Which makes me think DVD (not as sure about BD and UHD BD) could very much still be around in another 30 years. I think even if DVD becomes more and more niche year-on-year there will be at least one factory left making them. At its lowest point after cassettes, CDs, and emerging downloads nearly killed vinyl production, it was still being made in more than one factory. Even cassettes are to this day made in more than one factory.

Physical video games seem like they could die out as mainstream releases well before music and film/tv. Video games are larger in size typically and require much more engineering to be played given the interactive nature.