An ongoing patent lawsuit in Germany appears to have hit Disney+ where it hurts, forcing it to stop streaming Dolby Vision, HDR10+ and 3D to customers across Europe.
Disney hasn’t denied it has happened, but officially describes the issue as “technical challenges.” However, the real reason is likely to be legal, according to reports in Germany that were later spotted by FlatpanelsHD.
According to FlatpanelsHD, Disney is currently being sued in Germany over allegations of patent infringement, and that country happens to be the first place where Disney+ removed access to Dolby Vision and HDR10+ content. German Disney+ subscribers first reported they were unable to access the higher quality streams in late 2025, shortly after a regional court in Munich ordered Disney to stop infringing on a specific video compression patent.
That was bad enough, but now it seems that the issue is spreading. Late last week, multiple posts appeared on Reddit from users in Belgium, France, Poland, Portugal and the Netherlands all complaining about the same thing – they have also lost access to Dolby Vision and HDR10+. Most recently, some viewers in Denmark, Norway and Sweden are saying the same thing, though it does appear that U.K. viewers can still access both at the time of writing.
FlatpanelsHD says Disney+ has also dropped a number of 3D movie titles that use Dolby Vision when viewed using the Apple Vision Pro headset, though this is only going to affect a limited number of users.
Disney told FlatpanelsHD in a statement that Dolby Vision support is currently unavailable in some European countries because of “technical challenges” it is facing. It added that it’s “actively working to restore access” to the higher quality streams in the affected countries. It added that 4K UHD and HDR support “remain available on supported devices.”
Disney’s claims of technical challenges might be technically true – because it will indeed be technically challenging to support Dolby Vision and HDR10+ if you’re not allowed to use the essential video compression technology that’s required to do so. But it seems that the company isn’t telling the whole story. There are strong signs that the problem may be related to a much bigger issue, with all mentions of Dolby Vision disappearing not only from the company’s European support pages, but also its U.S. versions. We can't think of a precedent for a major streaming service doing this in response to a temporary bug.
In its statement, Disney made no mention of the legal action in Germany, which relates to a company called InterDigital, which claims that it’s owed a lot of money from the company that created Mickey Mouse and other cartoon legends. “Our innovation underpins the viability of the entire streaming industry,” it says in its complaint. “We expect those who benefit from the use of our IP to pay for a license to use it.”
If InterDigital’s legal challenge is indeed the reason for Disney+’s loss of support for Dolby Vision and HDR10+, it does perhaps make sense for Disney to try and avoid mentioning it. After all, it’s still charging millions of subscribers the full price for a premium service that has now lost one of its defining features, and some may feel as if they’re entitled to a discount.
