Xbox has said it will investigate reports that a recent network outage stopped players from accessing games on physical discs while offline, contradicting the principle that disc-based games should not require an internet connection. Xbox's Chief Technology Officer, Scott Van Vliet, told The Verge that "disc-based entitlement checks should not prevent players from accessing their games, and this is by design," and confirmed a full post-incident review is under way. The episode has renewed debate about the reliability of digital game ownership just as Sony prepares to phase out physical discs entirely.

The outage struck late on Sunday 26 July and was not fully resolved until late the following day, blocking account logins, game libraries and gameplay. Van Vliet attributed the fault to an external licensing service that Xbox relies on, calling the disruption "unacceptable" and pledging changes to prevent a single point of failure causing similar problems again. The disruption followed a separate PlayStation Network outage on 24 July, which similarly reinforced arguments in favour of physical media; Xbox is reportedly developing a system letting players convert discs into transferable digital licences, while Sony has said it will end physical disc production by January 2028.