- Dolby Vision and HDR10+ are not available on Disney+ in some European countries
- It may be connected to an ongoing patent dispute
- Advanced HDR is still available elsewhere right now, but Disney’s US support page doesn’t mention Dolby Vision at all
Has Disney dumped Dolby Vision in Europe? That’s what reports on Reddit and in several media outlets suggest. After Dolby Vision and HDR10+ disappeared from streams in Germany, several reports say they have disappeared in other countries as well.
According to Disney, what they’re experiencing are “technical challenges” – but as FlatpanelsHD points out, it’s very possible that the real reason is legal rather than technical.
Disney is currently being sued in a German court over claims of patent infringement, and Germany was the first place to lose Dolby Vision and HDR10+: it disappeared at the end of 2025, just after the regional court in Munich told Disney to stop infringing a specific video compression patent. And now viewers in other countries say Dolby’s disappeared from their video streams as well.
The mysterious case of the disappearing Dolby
On Reddit, subscribers from France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Portugal and Poland say they’ve lost Dolby Vision and HDR10+; viewers in the Nordic countries now say that the same technology is also gone from their streams. (However, TechRadar’s UK team still has Dolby Vision showing up just fine.)
In a statement provided to FlatpanelsHD, Disney said: “Dolby Vision support for content on Disney+ is currently unavailable in several European countries due to technical challenges. We are actively working to restore access to Dolby Vision and will provide an update as soon as possible. 4K UHD and HDR support remains available on supported devices.”
However, as FlatpanelsHD notes, Disney+ has removed “all references to Dolby Vision” from its European support pages – but in a sign that this problem may not remain confined to Europe, mentions are also gone from its US support pages.
It certainly lends weight to the notion that the disappearance of Dolby and HDR10+ is due to the patent dispute: when was the last time a streamer rewrote their website due to a temporary glitch in the app?
Disney+ has also removed 3D movies in Europe that use Dolby Vision when viewed on Apple Vision Pro, although this may affect a slightly lower number of people than on TV apps…
The company suing Disney, InterDigital, released a statement last year claiming Disney owes it big, though not in the exact words: “Our innovation supports the viability of the entire streaming industry…we expect those who benefit from the use of our IP to pay for a license to it.”
Disney hasn’t said the Dolby Vision removal is due to the lawsuit, but it hasn’t denied it either. And if that’s the reason, it’s bad news for European subscribers and possibly subscribers in other countries too, as Disney may decide to remove the feature there in anticipation of further legal action.
Whatever the reason, it’s not great for European customers: they’re still paying full price for a service that’s lost a key premium feature, even though 4K and regular HDR support remains.
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