Sony confirms PlayStation disc production ends in 2028 — and it's not changing course

By: Anton Kratiuk | today, 20:46

Sony has officially broken its silence on the PlayStation disc controversy: starting January 2028, the company will stop producing physical game discs — and CFO Lin Tao made clear at a Q1 2026 earnings call that no reversal is planned. The decision has drawn fierce criticism from gamers worldwide, but Sony is pressing ahead regardless.

The statement

Tao acknowledged that Sony has received "categorical opinions" from the gaming community and said the company "understands these emotions." The official line, however, is that broader content digitalization — across all of Sony's businesses, not just PlayStation — is the driving force behind the change. In plain terms: Sony heard you, and it's not budging.

New games released after January 2028 will only be available through the PlayStation Store or via physical retail boxes that contain download codes rather than discs. Titles already released before that date are unaffected.

What's at stake for gamers

The practical consequences are significant. No disc means no secondhand copy — you can't resell a download code the way you can sell a used game. The global secondhand gaming market is worth an estimated $7 billion, and disc discontinuation threatens a large slice of it.

In the UK, the Entertainment Retailers Association puts the disc-based games market at £300 million for 2025, with roughly one in four under-25s still buying physical copies. The ERA on UK disc market has formally objected to the move, calling it a blow to consumer freedom. Specialist retailers face serious pressure as a result.

Hopes that European regulators might intervene have largely faded. EU Consumer Protection Commissioner Michael McGrath has stated that companies are free to discontinue formats as long as consumer rights are otherwise protected — meaning the EU legal barrier absent is essentially nonexistent. No authority is currently in a position to force Sony's hand.

What comes next

Sony is framing its future relationship with gamers around a "digital ecosystem," though specifics remain thin. Microsoft and Xbox are widely expected to follow a similar path, which would leave the entire major-console market disc-free within a few years. That timeline puts independent game retailers and second-hand shops under mounting pressure heading into 2026 and beyond.

If you own a PS5 with a disc drive, your existing library isn't going anywhere. But for anyone who relies on buying, selling, or borrowing physical copies, the window to do so is closing — and Sony has now said, on the record, that it won't reopen.