Everything You Need To Know About Xbox Disc-To-Digital

How Xbox Disc-To-Digital Works, What's Included, And Everything Else You Need To Know Published Sep 2, 2026, 9:34 AM EDT Josh Coulson is an editor at TheGamer covering breaking news on everything from colorful platformers to the latest Lego sets. Primarily a news writer since 2018, Josh has covered just about every major game from the past decade. Now an editor, their focus has shifted to being the leading affiliate expert at the site, building relationships between TheGamer and global brands including Mattel, Funko, and The Pokemon Company. Sign in to your TheGamer account Xbox has started rolling out its disc-to-digital initiative. If you're an Xbox Insider, you can use it right now and start claiming digital licenses for your physical games. Even though the feature is now live, there's still a lot of confusion regarding what exactly it does, how it works, and what's included, so I'm going to try to clear up as much of that confusion as I can. How To Claim Digital Licenses For Your Physical Games Xbox If you have access to the program, or you plan on taking advantage of it once it's rolled out to everyone and you want to know how, it really couldn't be simpler. All you have to do is insert the disc. You will be greeted with a menu, and on that menu you'll see the option to "Claim digital license". Click that, and job done. That really is all you need to do. Once you have claimed a game's digital license, not only will you be able to then play that game on your console without inserting the disc, but you'll have access to it through your Xbox profile in other ways, too. Whether that be Xbox Play Anywhere or on other consoles. It even means you can now play physical games on the disc-drive-less Series S, provided you have a disc drive elsewhere through which to claim the licenses. What Happens To Your Digital License If Someone Else Uses Its Physical Counterpart Xbox There has been some confusion regarding what you can then do with the physical copies after the digital license has been claimed. If you want to keep the game, you cannot sell or trade it in. As soon as the physical copy of the game is inserted into another disc drive and its digital license is claimed, that license is revoked from your account. Since you no longer own the physical copy, the digital copy will be taken along with it. Great news for the trade-in market, bad news for those trying to cheat the system. There is also no truth to claims that you only have a limited amount of time to claim your digital licenses before they expire. Xbox's "time out" wording had some fearing that eventually, you wouldn't be able to claim a digital license using a physical disc. Windows Central has confirmed with Xbox that's not the case, and the wording simply refers to what happens if the game gets a new owner. The Growing List Of Eligible Games Marvel There is no definitive list of eligible games. Xbox has simply said that there are thousands of them, and that more will be added in time. However, there is already a user-made database dedicated to tracking down every single eligible title, along with all of the games that aren't compatible. It's called XCT.live, and so far Xbox owners have confirmed 947 games with physical versions can now be added to your digital libraries. The biggest discovery in terms of what's eligible and what isn't so far is finding out that delisted games are compatible. Titles like Deadpool and the old Forza Horizon games, while no longer available on the Xbox store, do have digital versions you can claim if you own physical copies. The research will continue, and the list of eligible games will grow. However, the compatible platforms might never change. Xbox has been very clear that the only games compatible with its disc-to-digital program are ones released during its last two generations, so Xbox One and Xbox Series X|S. That's because the discs for games released on those platforms have an identifier that makes this new era for the platform possible. That likely means there might never be a day when Xbox 360 and original Xbox games are added to the list of eligible titles. Brand Microsoft Original Release Date November 10, 2020 Original MSRP (USD) $499 Operating System Proprietary (Windows-based) Processor Custom AMD 8-core Zen 2 3.8 GHz Resolution 720p - 4K UHD - how to do it - what do you now own once youve done it - what happens if i sell the game/there is no time out - which games are included/delisted titles