Disney Plus on Sky Q is missing key features

To the UK’s delight, Disney+ has arrived and although you can get the streaming service on a large number of devices, watching on Sky Q doesn’t give you the full experience.

Despite Sky uniquely integrating Netflix onto the Sky Q platform, watching Disney+ via one of the most popular TV services in the country means you miss out on both 4K Ultra HD quality and HDR.

Sky might have the ‘widest range of TV available in UHD’ but won’t be adding Disney+ content in 4K until “later this year”. This may or may not coincide with it launching on Now TV.

This means watching Disney+ on Sky Q is limited to HD quality (1080p) when a large number of the other compatible devices such as smart TV and streaming boxes support both 4K and HDR. Meanwhile, the interface is even lower at 720p.

Sky Q customers have been waiting for HDR (High Dynamic Range) for a while and it looks like it won’t arrive until late in 2020 at the earliest. Hopefully Disney+ 4K content will arrive at the same time as HDR support.

Disney+ doesn’t charge extra for features like 4K or HDR like Netflix does with its Premium tier subscription, so you’ll still be paying the full price of £5.99 per month regardless of the streaming quality

It’s notable that this is the first time content such as the original Star Wars trilogy has been available in 4K.

Netflix is currently restricting quality for 30 days in Europe to help ease the strain of additional traffic during the coronavirus outbreak.

The news comes after some confusion about how Disney+ would be integrated into the Sky Q interface.

The app arrived on Sky Q boxes on launch day but being able to see and launch Disney content alongside Sky and Netflix shows around the interface won’t arrive until the end of April. This is also when customers will be able to buy Disney+ from Sky itself rather than from Disney.

You can launch the Disney+ app with the Sky voice control but using the search function is limited to Sky and Netflix content for now.