Back in the time while watching a DVD movie on a computer, all we needed to do was pop the DVD into the computer and launch a video player to watch the film loaded in the disc.
But things change when watching a Blu-ray movie on a computer, such easiness will be gone. Simply opening the Windows Media Player cannot play the BD movie. This Windows player utility will tell you it’s unable to play the Blu-ray.
The situation gets worse when you use a laptop that doesn’t have a disc drive to pop the Blu-ray disc.
Nevertheless, we must learn how to play Blu-ray content on our PC. In this post, you will find information about playing Blu-rays on a Windows PC or laptop. Stay tuned.
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Connect A Blu-ray Drive to Your PC/Laptop
“Can I play Blu-rays on my laptop/desktop?”
Most Windows computers, both laptops and desktops, are not sold with an internal Blu-ray drive. Only a few high-end models of HP, ASUS, ACER, and MSI are built with an eligible disc drive.
To tell if your Windows PC supports a Blu-ray, simply insert a Blu-ray disc into the tray. You will see a notification on the screen that notifies the playback failure when your computer is incapable.
No pop-up? Go to File Explorer, find the name of the Blu-ray disc, and stream it.
Connect An External Blu-ray Drive to Play Blu-ray On PC
When your PC lacks the ability to play Blu-ray directly, get an external Blu-ray drive.
You can check on the Blu-ray player (if there’s one) that’s connected to your TV. If you find a USB cord on the hardware, try to take out a USB cable and connect it to your computer.
You may buy a compatible one at local stores or from Amazon. Remember to check on the specs of the Blu-ray players and order one that fits your needs:
- Supported Source: You can buy one that supports playing DVDs and Blu-rays. The price will not differ.
- Connector Type: A USB connection is the only matter. Some models offer wireless connection via Wi-Fi, it’s up to you to decide.
- Function: HD (1080p) is the very basic feature of Blu-ray players. UHD (4K) and 3D are extra modifications if you’re okay to add up a few bucks.
- Prices: An HD Blu-ray player for a PC will normally start at around $55 on Amazon. Don’t spend too much on a regular device.
- Region: You can save some money and buy a Region B – US BD player. Or get a region-free BD player to stream discs from various regions.
Play Blu-ray on PC with echoshare Blu-ray Player (Windows 10 &11)
There’s no eligible Blu-ray player software on even Windows 11.
Unlike regular video formats like mp4, WMV, and DVD, the BD format requires specific codecs to decode and play. Video players, for example, Windows Media Player and a large number of normal video players, are ineligible to play Blu-ray on Windows. And a perfectly designed Blu-ray player surely can.
Use echoshare Blu-ray Player to Watch Blu-rays on PC
Standing on the cutting edge of Blu-ray playback, echoshare Blu-ray Player is a gift for Blu-ray novices and professionals.
Designed to be simple, it takes only 1 click to display a BD film on your computer without any difficult setup at all.
Thanks to its great decoding ability, echoshare Blu-ray Player delivers you an HD movie in 10 seconds after you hit Open Disc/File when some BD players will take 1 minute. Besides, its decoding ability also allows you to play BD folders, DVDs, and ISOs along with all the regular video formats. You can use it as the default video player on your PC.
- Play commercial Blu-ray discs directly.
- Play Blu-ray ISO file and Blu-ray folder.
- Play any DVD disc/folder/ISO file.
- Play any digital video formats (HD and 4K supported).
Supporting 4K playback and Dolby 7.1 surround sound effects, you can have unprecedented frames and sound enjoyment from the movie viewing.
To find out more, download the app on your computer and have a go then.
Once a Blu-ray drive is connected, we can start to watch Blu-ray movies on the PC via echoshare Blu-ray Player.
Step 1: Insert the Blu-ray disc into the drive slot.
Step 2: On your PC, launch the Blu-ray player software.
Step 3: On the main interface, click the Open Disc button, and select the name of the target Blu-ray.
Step 4: Hit OK and the Blu-ray player will start to generate the frames.
Enjoy the Blu-ray movie on your Windows PC now!
Play Blu-ray on PC with VLC (Windows 10 &11)
Besides echoshare Blu-ray Player, there’re multiple options of Blu-ray player software on the internet. We may apply a famous one: VLC Media Player.
This is an open-source media player program that works on PC, Mac, and Linux. Besides playing digital files, this freeware media player can also be of great help to play Blu-ray discs. It can process Blu-ray formats with fast speed and play Blu-ray movies with ease.
Also, as an open-source program, users can freely install codecs and plugins to the software to make it out of expectations. And everything in the app is 100% free including those third-party plugins and codecs.
Now, let’s see how VLC helps play a Blu-ray on a PC.
Step 1:
To begin with, download this media player software on your PC. Make sure you download the right version according to the Windows OS – 64bit or 32bit.
If you have VLC on your computer, launch the program on update it to the latest version via Help – Check For Update.
Step 2:
Insert the Blu-ray disc into the external Blu-ray drive. Back to VLC and hit Media – Open Disc.
On the new window, browse to select the name of the inserted Blu-ray disc. Hit Play. VLC will start generating the Blu-ray frames on the interface.
Relatively, you can also go to File Explorer and locate the Blu-ray icon. Right-click on it and choose to open with VLC.
Note: VLC Can’t Play Blu-rays on PC
Natively, VLC lacks the feature to load encrypted Blu-ray discs. So, when trying to play a commercial Blu-ray with the media player, VLC may fail to generate frames and display only failure notifications.
To fix this, we need to add Blu-ray plugins to VLC to upgrade the software and give it the ability to play encrypted Blu-rays.
Go to VLC Blu-ray and download two files for VLC: keydb.cfg and libaacs.dll. Then, add the two files to right positions:
- Put keydb.cfg to “This PC – C:// – User – (Your Username) – Appdata – Roaming – aacs”. Under the directory of Roaming, create the “aacs” folder.
- Put libaacs.dll to VLC file location. Right-click on the VLC desktop app and open the file location. Copy and paste the DLL file there.
Bonus: Play Blu-ray on PC Without A Blu-ray Player
The Blu-ray player is not a necessary kit every time we play a Blu-ray on PC. We can rip the Blu-ray disc and save the disc content on the hard drive.
In this way, we can play the Blu-ray movie directly and locally without the optical disc and drive. The Blu-ray file is safely saved on your computer and you can watch it with a simple double-click.
If you want to play the Blu-ray locally without a Blu-ray drive, start to rip the Blu-ray on your PC then. Download a Blu-ray ripper like echoshare Blu-ray Converter. This is a handy Blu-ray ripper tool that can help you extract Blu-ray videos, audio, and subtitles from a Blu-ray disc in minutes. All you need is to make a few clicks and wait for 5 minutes.
Download it and let’s start to make Blu-ray available on your PC.
Step 1:
Connect the external Blu-ray drive and insert a Blu-ray disc.
Launch echoshare Blu-ray Converter on your PC and hit Load Blu-ray to import the Blu-ray disc into the Ripper program.
Step 2:
Next, you can choose to either rip only the main movie or all video clips of the Blu-ray disc.
By default, the ripper will display and rip only the movie file along with primary audio and subtitle tracks. Hit Full Title List to rip other videos as well. And hit Audio and Subtitle to pick other tracks.
Decide the format and destination folder for the output files.
Step 3:
Click on Rip All to start ripping the Blu-ray disc. When the process is complete, play the Blu-ray movie directly.