The online rental business in the US and Europe will generate more than $1bn in consumer spending for the first time in 2005. This new phenomenon in the video industry has grown from its inception in the US in 1999 by combining new technology, in the form of DVD, with a much older delivery system: the post.
In the US, the world's largest video rental market, the US, online rental has already had a profound impact on the rental business. The model's pioneer, San Francisco-based Netflix, already claimed more than three and a half million subscribers in 2005, and in response, the established giant of high street rental, Blockbuster, has entered the fray, whilst simultaneous abolishing late fees for its US customers. In Europe too, home-grown internet upstarts lead the field.
Key findings:
By the end of 2005 there will be more than 6.3 million online DVD rental subscribers in the US and Europe, generating more than $1b of consumer spending.
The UK dominates the European market, followed by Germany and thriving markets have been established in France and Scandinavia.
The online sector already accounts for more than one in ten video rentals in the UK. By 2009, more than half the UK's rental transactions, and rental spending, will be online.
Almost 45m DVDs will be posted to online subscribers in Europe in 2005, while more that 381m will be delivered to mail boxes in the US.
Across the key European markets, online rental made only a little more than one fiftieth of total consumer spending in 2004. The dramatic flourishing of the market will bring that proportion to over one third of the total by the end of our forecast period in 2009.
Screendigest
Nov 2005
Market Data 
Markets 
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