Google Play Starts Testing 4K UHD Movie Purchase and Rental Options

The roll out of any form of technology usually happens in phases. Just like it happened with the high-definition resolution standard, the world seems to be taking its time to adjust to the 4K or UHD (2160x3840 pixels) resolution standard. However, Google has finally decided to acknowledge that people do want to watch their content in 4K as the company is now reportedly testing 4K resolution option for movies on Google Play in the US.

The move to offer movies in 4K resolution should hardly come as a surprise from the company considering that it started shipping its Chromecast Ultra dongle, with support for 4K, earlier this month in the US. As per a report by The Next Web, currently titles such as 'The Fifth Element' and 'Elysium' are both available with a UHD option on both Google Play and Google Play Movies & TV apps. However some titles like 'Star Trek: Beyond', despite showing a 4K tag, don't show the new price option.

Notably, the 4K purchase or rental option is still not yet enabled completely, as users report cannot purchase or rent the 4K options yet, and are shown an error. The options are also not visible on the Web interface yet. Also worth noting is that if users already have the HD or SD version of the movie in their library, they are not shown the 4K option.

Every rental in UHD resolution is available at a price of $7.99 (roughly Rs. 550), compared with $3.99 (roughly Rs. 270) for HD resolution and $2.99 (roughly Rs. 200) for SD version. If we talk about the purchase price, the price difference becomes even more noticeable with 4K content available in a range from $24.99 (roughly Rs. 1,700) to $29.99 (roughly Rs. 2,050), compared with $12.99 (roughly Rs. 900) price tag for HD purchase, as pointed out by TNW.

The 4K resolution option for the same movies is currently not available on Google Play India.

It will be interesting to see if the search giant decides to cut down prices after the full rollout of the higher resolution option or keeps the prices at the current levels. If it does decide to stick with the premium pricing, people might have to shell out large sums to watch content meant for their 4K television sets.