Crunchyroll, the anime streaming service owned by Sony, has significantly scaled back its physical media store, removing all books from sale and drastically cutting its Blu-ray selection. The move has alarmed anime fans and collectors, who had already been wary that Sony's ownership might deprioritise physical releases in favour of streaming, and the update appears to confirm those fears were, if anything, understated.

Reports indicate the store overhaul stripped out its entire book catalogue and left only a reduced range of Blu-ray titles available to buy. The changes add to wider concerns within the anime community about the long-term future of physical media as major platforms consolidate around digital distribution, with Crunchyroll's shift seen as a notable signal given its position as one of the industry's largest anime distributors in the West.