Sony Interactive Entertainment announced that from January 2028 it will stop manufacturing physical discs for all newly released PlayStation console games. Titles arriving after that point will be sold digitally only, through the PlayStation Store and retail partners. Games already released on disc, or scheduled for a disc release before January 2028, are unaffected by the policy.

Sid Shuman, senior director of content communications at SIE, framed the move as following consumer behavior, noting that preference for digital media now substantially outpaces physical discs.

Backlash collided with the end of legacy hardware support

The PlayStation Blog post drew more than 5,500 comments within a day, most of them critical. The recurring objections were that digital copies cannot be resold or traded, and that what a buyer ultimately owns is a license rather than the game itself.

The reaction intensified because Sony announced on the same day that PlayStation Store support for PS3 and PS Vita would end after July 2027. Committing new releases to digital-only distribution while closing the digital storefronts on older hardware struck many as contradictory. Sony's position is that it wants to concentrate support on current-generation systems.