ray 4K UHD will be the end of physical media formats

By Chris Hinton Published Aug 8, 2026, 11:00 AM EDT Chris is experienced in entertainment media publication with an encyclopedic knowledge and ever-abiding love for video games, movies, television, and 80's hair metal. Many of his past writing credits include published work at Looper, Digital Trends, Gaming Bolt, Screen Rant, The Gamer, CBR, and Fextralife. He is based in southern Mississippi and is always finding new ways to stay cool and beat the southern heat while staying up-to-date on all things Batman. Sign in to your Pocket-lint account Add Us Summary Generate a summary of this story Like Like follow Follow followed Followed Thread 12 Log in Here is a fact-based summary of the story contents: Try something different: Show me the facts Explain it like I’m 5 Give me a lighthearted recap In the past 4 decades, entertainment media has rapidly changed. Just look at the trajectory of music media. Vinyl records, surprisingly, entered the world at the start of the Great Depression. In the post-war era, vinyl began to flourish. Music was no longer a happenstance on the radio, but could be played at will on home-bound record players. Eventually, compact cassettes and 8-track tapes came along in the 60s. CDs (Compact Discs) would enter the zeitgeist in the early 80s. These sleek, futuristic-looking discs would be the new king of the hill, that is, until digital music saw a boon with the advent of MP3 players and iPods. From a physical perspective in the digital age, vinyl, cassettes, and CDs have all found a niche market for music collectors looking to stock a physical library of music. But the debut of the digital option sealed the deal on CDs being the final mainstream physical iteration of music media.