After Apple announced Apple TV 4k and the price of 4k content to purchase on it, we’ve seen a dip in price of some new blockbuster movie titles. For example, today’s release of Sony’s Spider-Man: Homecoming to digital formats is only $19.99 in 4k UHD, the second major studio title priced that low following TriStar’s Baby Driver last week.
To compare, other movie releases in 4k Digital such as The House, The Mummy, and Wonder Woman were all priced $29.99 on release day. However, some titles such as today’s Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales and the summer hit Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 are priced slightly lower at $24.99.
These price drops for 4k digital movies could be attributed to Apple’s newly launched library of 4k movies on iTunes that sell for the same price as HD movies — typically $14.99 to $19.99 for new blockbusters. The company also announced that eligible titles purchased in HD would be upgraded to 4k at no extra charge.
The reduction in price for UHD movies (as Google Play, Vudu and other services refer to the 4k format) was bound to happen at some point. $29.99 is a steep price to pay for a digital movie, even if the resolution does have 4-times the detail as 1080p (Full HD) and may even have deeper color depth with HDR.
Apple’s recent announcement may have pushed competing video services to drop the price of 4k movies a bit quicker than they would have wanted to, because if Apple is selling 4k titles for $20 they really have no other choice.
