Sony has announced that it will end support for new games on disc from January 2028, effectively killing off the market for physical format video games as a mainstream concern.

In a blog post announcing the change, PlayStation’s US communications director Sid Shuman said it was a natural direction for games, as consumer behaviour had shifted away from physical media across all entertainment.

“This transition will enable us to align more closely with how most of our community prefers to access and play games today,” he said.

“We’ll continue to prioritise our resources to drive innovation in how players can access games, and provide choices as to where players prefer to purchase new games, whether that’s at retailers or PlayStation Store.”

The announcement comes after Rockstar Games announced last week that its hotly anticipated Grand Theft Auto VI would be digital only at launch later this year. Sony’s wording implies that future PlayStation games will be available in physical stores as boxes with download codes inside, like GTA. When downloaded from the PlayStation Store, ownership of these games is tied to the purchaser’s account, much like an app downloaded from Apple or Google’s store.

Sony has separately said that its next generation of PlayStation consoles would move “beyond the living room”, which some analysts have taken to mean it may be a portable device like the Nintendo Switch, with no way to accept discs at all.

The video game industry has been moving towards a digital-only future for some time. Microsoft announced radical changes in that direction when unveiling its Xbox One in 2013, but reversed them after significant criticism, including from Sony.

On mobile and PC, the two biggest and fastest-growing platforms for games, there are no options to buy physical at all. The current PlayStation consoles do not have a disc drive by default, though you can add one for an extra cost. Many games sold at retail contain download codes rather than discs, and in any event discs are too slow and low-capacity to actually play modern games; they must be installed to a hard drive, and usually require game data or updates to be downloaded.

There are still physical Xbox games being produced, but disc drives are also optional on those consoles, and Microsoft has all-but confirmed its next-generation box will run Windows, implicitly ending support for discs there too. Rumours have indicated Microsoft may be working on a way for players to gain digital licences for games they own on disc, which Sony could also offer in theory.

Nintendo produces game cards for its Switch 2, though it sells them for a higher price versus the digital games on its eShop. Some publishers on Switch 2 sell Game Key Cards at retail, which tie the game licence to a physical cartridge you need to insert into the system to play, but which contain no actual game data.

While it’s true that consumer behaviour has shifted sharply towards buying digital, ending support for physical games does have some weighty implications.

Stores like EB Games may find digital codes more difficult to sell than discs, though they have largely transitioned to selling retro games, merch and collector’s editions. Players will be unable to sell their copies of games they’ve finished playing. Older games on disc will not work in next-generation consoles. And the work of game preservation will be made much more difficult, as there’s no legal way to extract and store code from a downloaded game on a console.

Several boutique publishers currently serve the community of physical game stalwarts, but it’s unclear how the businesses could continue into 2028 unless they stick to Switch 2. Publishers could potentially produce discs for open platforms like PC, though they’d open themselves up to a risk of piracy.

The change to digital-only also means players are reliant on online infrastructure to maintain their games. When support for a PlayStation platform eventually ends, players will have no way to download games they have legally purchased rights for. As if to underline this point, Sony also announced this week that it would end online support for its PlayStation 3 and PlayStation Vita platforms in 2027. That means a physical copy of a game from 15 years ago will work on a PS3, but you will not be able to purchase a digital copy from the console’s store. Sony said it will still allow players to download games they have already bought.

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Tim Biggs is a writer covering consumer technology, gadgets and video games.Connect via X or email.