Microsoft has announced that it's shutting down the Movies & TV storefront on the Microsoft Store. As of July 18, it is no longer possible to purchase new media content, whether that be on a Windows PC or Xbox, using the Microsoft Store.
"Microsoft no longer offers new entertainment content for purchase, including movies and TV shows, on Microsoft.com, Microsoft Store on Windows, and the Microsoft Store on Xbox" says a Microsoft support page published today.
Accessing media via the Entertainment tab in the Microsoft Store app now shows an alert that says "Microsoft will no longer be making movies and TV content available for purchase," with the button to buy movies or TV shows outright removed.
The company does say that users who have purchased Movies & TV content from the Microsoft Store in the past will continue to be able to access that content via the Movies & TV app, which can be downloaded from the Microsoft Store. It's just the storefront itself that's going away.
This has been a long time coming, especially after Microsoft killed its music streaming service, Groove Music, all the way back in 2017. Ever since, people have assumed Movies & TV would be next, and now that day is finally here. Microsoft says it will not be offering refunds for recent purchases.
If you live in the US, you can utilize a service called Movies Anywhere to sync your purchased content to other services that also support Movies Anywhere. For those not in a region where this is possible, you will have to keep using the Movies & TV app to stream the content you've purchased in the past.
This will be frustrating news for anyone who has built up a large collection of Movies & TV content using Microsoft's service over the years. They'll now have to switch to a new platform to continue that collection. If you wanted all your stuff in one place, that's no longer an option.
Now, the company says if you want to continue watching movies & TV on Windows or Xbox platforms, you should sign up for third-party platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, and others.
Microsoft first launched Movies & TV back in 2012 under the name Xbox Video and was part of the Xbox Entertainment ecosystem that let users subscribe to a music pass and rent or buy movies & TV. The company has since slowly exited from the entertainment business in all areas apart from gaming.
The Xbox Music and Xbox Video services superseded Zune Music and Zune Video, which launched in the 2000's and was ahead of the curve with streaming. With Movies & TV finally bowing out, that marks the end of an almost 20-year run of Microsoft selling linear entertainment media.
What will happen to my purchased content?
Microsoft says that all content purchased via the Microsoft Store will continue to be available to stream via the Movies & TV app, which will continue to exist.
"You can continue to enjoy your previously purchased movies and TV shows using the Microsoft Movies & TV app on your Xbox or Windows device" says Microsoft.
Now, we just have to hope Microsoft commits to keeping those servers alive so that already purchased content is always available.
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