Credit: The Walt Disney Company

Disney+ has started streaming movies and shows in the HDR10+ format.

Support is somewhat limited for now. Only certain content from Hulu, which The Walt Disney Company acquired in June, is available in HDR10+. In an announcement today, Samsung said that “over 1,000” Hulu titles are available in HDR10+ and that “additional Disney+” content will support HDR10+ “in the future.” Previously, Disney+ only supported the HDR10 and Dolby Vision HDR formats.

Samsung TVs are the first devices to gain the ability to stream HDR10+ content from Disney+, according to an announcement from Samsung today. The electronics company said that its Samsung Crystal UHD TVs and above from 2018 onward, including its OLED TVs, The Frame TVs, QLED TVs, and Micro RGB TV, support HDR10+.

The Disney+ app on Apple’s tvOS also lists HDR10+, site FlatpanelsHD pointed out.

Hulu started offering some content in HDR10, HDR10+, and Dolby Vision in 2021. Now that Disney owns Hulu and has created a unified app with both Disney+ and Hulu content, Disney+ is also able to offer a restricted number of titles in HDR10+.

Today’s announcement also caters to Samsung TV users, since Samsung TVs don’t support Dolby Vision. By offering HDR10+, Disney+ can make itself more appealing to the many home theater enthusiasts who own a TV from Samsung, which is the world’s top-selling TV brand.

HDR10+ in streaming

Compared to HDR10, which relies on static metadata, HDR10+ is more advanced and uses dynamic metadata, allowing content creators to control how each individual frame looks. Both HDR10+ and rival format Dolby Vision are helpful for addressing black levels and other image-quality weaknesses in an HDR display. However, Dolby Vision takes things even further by offering more color control via 12-bit color and different profiles and levels, or the “maximum pixel rate, maximum decoded bitstream video width, and maximum bit rate supported by a product within a given bitstream profile,” as Dolby puts it.

Dolby Vision’s advanced capabilities, combined with its three years of seniority over HDR10+, have led to its greater adoption. Still, HDR10+ support can be advantageous for streaming services like Disney+, which are increasingly scrutinized by customers amid growing competition and rising prices.

Netflix added HDR10+ support in March. The Amazon Prime Video and Apple TV streaming services also support HDR10+. While some streaming services, including Netflix and Prime Video, require people to purchase more expensive subscriptions in order to watch in HDR, people subscribed to Disney+’s cheapest subscription plan can stream content in HDR.

Disney+’s improved HDR game follows increases to its streaming service prices last month.