Sony's plan to end physical PlayStation disc production by 2028 will remove the used-game market that often undercuts digital prices, according to an Ars Technica analysis of 19 current bestselling PlayStation titles. The investigation compared standard and discounted digital prices on the PlayStation Store against new and used disc prices from Amazon, GameStop and eBay, finding that the loss of cheap second-hand discs could leave players facing consistently higher costs once physical media disappears.

The analysis found the "standard" digital price was the most expensive option for 15 of the 19 games studied, with some titles six to eight years old, such as Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and two Assassin's Creed entries, still sold digitally at their original $59.99 launch price even as used discs were available for as little as $9.99. However, periodic PlayStation Store sales, which cut standard prices by 40 to 80 percent, made downloads the cheapest option for 10 of the 19 games, sometimes beating even the lowest used disc prices by half or more, suggesting savvy shoppers who wait for sales may not lose out much once discs vanish.