With completely no warning and nil gilding the lily, Microsoft has abruptly shut down the power to purchase films and TV reveals through its retailer on Xbox and PC.
Folks grew to become conscious of this as they visited the story, solely to be greeted by error messages. Microsoft, in the meantime, had posted up a Q&A detailing the adjustments whereas they within the course of of really making them.
when you try to entry the Films & TV retailer on Xbox it simply errors out after Microsoft’s sudden closure at this time https://t.co/RpCRmx7W9F pic.twitter.com/SbHMSeuOSH
— Tom Warren (@tomwarren) July 18, 2025
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“Microsoft has stopped promoting new film and TV content material,” says the Q&A.
The excellent news – if it may be referred to as that – is you can nonetheless watch the entire reveals and flicks that you simply already purchased.
“You may proceed to get pleasure from your current purchases utilizing the Microsoft Films & TV app in your Xbox or Home windows gadget,” Xbox mentioned, whereas unexpectedly ripping down its personal storefront.
To date, Xbox and Microsoft haven’t issued any official assertion on why this resolution was made, or why it was so sudden.
I’m going to imagine that the most definitely purpose is that the storefront simply wasn’t very profitable. Netflix, Amazon, HBO Max (or no matter they’re calling it as of late) and a bunch of different subscriptions fashions are the dominant drive, and I can’t think about Microsoft’s film and TV storefront was driving loads of gross sales or leases in comparison with its working prices.
Nonetheless, it’s peculiar for it to be shut down so abruptly. On the very least, firms usually announce this stuff prematurely, if nothing else as a result of individuals will typically panic purchase a bunch of stuff earlier than it closes.
That mentioned, I can not bear in mind the final time I used the shop.
It is also associated to Microsoft’s newest spree of layoffs, which has resulted in 1000’s of individuals shedding their jobs.