Toy Story 5 is moving onto premium video on demand on Tuesday, Aug. 18, after a box office run that pushed it to $1.097 billion worldwide. The film opened in theaters on June 19 and is now headed to paid digital platforms, where viewers will be able to buy it at home rather than wait for a subscription service.
That search interest is easy to explain. The Disney and Pixar release did not just clear $1 billion; it finished with $473.1 million from domestic theaters and $624.2 million internationally, a pace that puts it among Pixar’s biggest earners and gives the digital launch more weight than a routine home-entertainment rollout. Andrew Stanton directed the film, which stars Tom Hanks, Tim Allen and Joan Cusack.
Jessie is at the center of the story’s emotional thread, feeling obsolete because of Lilypad and reaching out to Woody for help before heading off on an unexpected adventure to the home of her original owner. Buzz Lightyear is dealing with the same upheaval in his own way, encountering factory-fresh new-and-improved Lightyear toys on a mission to find Star Command. The home release tries to match that scale: purchased digital copies will include five production featurettes, five deleted scenes and commentary by Kenna Harris, Bob Pauley and Thomas Jordan, while Taylor Swift’s official music and lyric videos for the end-title song, I Knew It, I Knew You, are reserved for the digital edition.
The wrinkle is in the wording around the release itself. Toy Story 5 is being promoted as a streaming release this week, but the film is actually arriving on PVOD for purchase on Apple TV, Fandango at Home, Prime Video and YouTube Movies & TV, not as part of a standard subscription library. That means the real question for viewers is not whether they can watch it now, but how much Disney will charge for the digital copy or rental, a price it has not set out here.
The next stop is already fixed. Toy Story 5 is slated for 4K Ultra HD, Blu-ray and DVD on Sept. 22, which turns this week’s digital arrival into the first step in a staggered home release that begins with paid access and ends with a physical shelf date.
