Vudu Forum Guidelines
Nov 14, 2016 - VUDU's new offline download feature allows you to save on data charges and watch your movies offline. You can download either rented.
The Vudu Forums are designed to help viewers get the most out of their Vudu experience. Here, Vudu customers may post information, questions, ideas, etc. on the subject of Vudu and Vudu -related issues (home theater, entertainment, etc). Although the primary purpose of these forums is to help Vudu customers with questions and/or problems with their VUDU service, there are also off-topic areas available within the Vudu Forums for users to chat with like-minded people, subject to the limitations below.
Please post all comments in English. When posting a comment in the Vudu Forums, please conduct yourself in a respectful and civil manner. While we respect that you may feel strongly about an issue, please leave room for discussion.
Vudu reserves the right to refrain from posting and/or to remove user comments, including comments that contain any of the following:
1. Obscenities, defamatory language, discriminatory language, or other language not suitable for a public forum
2. Email addresses, phone numbers, links to websites, physical addresses or other forms of contact information
3. 'Spam' content, references to other products, advertisements, or other offers
4. Spiteful or inflammatory comments about other users or their comments
5. Comments that may potentially violate the DMCA or any other applicable laws
6. Comments that discuss ways to manipulate Vudu products/services, including, but not limited to, reverse engineering, video extraction, and file conversion.
Additionally, please keep in mind that although Vudu retains the right to monitor, edit, and/or remove posts within Vudu Forums, it does not necessarily review every comment. Accordingly, specific questions about Vudu products and services should be directed to Vudu customer service representatives.
Terms of Use - User Comments, Feedback, Reviews, Submissions
For all reviews, comments, feedback, postcards, suggestions, ideas, and other submissions disclosed, submitted or offered to Vudu, on or through this Site, by e-mail or telephone, or otherwise disclosed, submitted or offered in connection you use of this Site (collectively, the 'Comments') you grant Vudu a royalty-free, irrevocable, transferable right and license to use the Comments however Vudu desires, including, without limitation, to copy, modify, delete in its entirety, adapt, publish, translate, create derivative works from and/or sell and /or distribute such Comments and/or incorporate such Comments into any form, medium or technology throughout the world.
Vudu will be entitled to use, reproduce, disclose, modify, adapt, create derivative works from, publish, display and distribute any Comments you submit for any purpose whatsoever, without restriction and without compensating you in any way. Vudu is and shall be under no obligation (1) to maintain any Comments in confidence; (2) to pay to users any compensation for any Comments; or (3) to respond to any user Comments. You agree that any Comments submitted by you to the Site will not violate the terms in this Terms of Use or any right of any third party, including without limitation, copyright, trademark, privacy or other personal or proprietary right(s), and will not cause injury to any person or entity. You further agree that no Comments submitted by you to this Site will be or contain libelous or otherwise unlawful, threatening, abusive or obscene material, or contain software viruses, political campaigning, commercial solicitation, chain letters, mass mailings or any form of 'spam.'
You grant Vudu the right to use the name that you submit in connection with any Comments. You agree not to use a false email address, impersonate any person or entity, otherwise mislead as to the origin of any Comments you submit. You are, and shall remain, solely responsible for the content of any Comments you make and you agree to indemnify Vudu for all claims resulting from any Comments you submit. Vudu takes no responsibility and assumes no liability for any Comments submitted by you or any third-party.
Streaming services like Netflix and Hulu are just a few taps away, but they don't offer movies that have just come out on video. For that, you need a different type of store, which is where Vudu comes in. There, you can buy or rent most new movies as soon as they become available, with prices starting at $4.99. Let's see how Vudu compares to the stores run by Apple, Google, Amazon, and others.
Pros
Easy to use: The home screen of the app does a good job of providing options without overwhelming you with them. Sections have sensible titles like 'Popular Rentals,' Family Favorites,' and '99-cent Monthly Rentals.' When you tap on a movie, you'll get its important details at a glance: genre, year of release, a star rating, synopsis, and buttons to access the trailer, your wishlist, and social sharing tools. Scrolling down will reveal similar movies you might like, portraits of the cast that you can tap on to see what else they were in, and some critic reviews.
4K and HDR content available: Most digital movie stores are still in the process of figuring out how to deliver 4K streams. Google's own movie rental and purchase store has yet to make this leap, but Vudu is already rolling out 4K, HDR, Dolby Atmos, and Dolby Vision, which will give you the best audiovisual quality that you're going to get over the Internet (though not all new movies will take advantage of all of these features).
It's also currently the only video service that offers Star Wars: The Last Jedi in 4K; Disney (the owner of Star Wars and Marvel Comics) has shown disinterest in participating in Apple's initiative to make 4K streams cost the same as the 1080p options, instead opting to not offer a 4K option on Apple's store at all, except in cases like these.
Device compatibility and content downloads to pick up where you left off: In addition to Android and iOS devices, Vudu is available in many smart TVs, home streaming devices, game consoles, and in a web browser (although the browser version requires Adobe Flash, which you may have disabled for security reasons). So you can start a movie on your phone and finish it on your TV, or vice versa. The company has a page on its website dedicated to listing all the compatible devices.
If you want to watch on your phone or tablet, you can download your purchases for offline viewing, so that you don't have to worry about connection interruptions when you're on-the-go.
Integrated with Movies Anywhere: Blu-ray movies at retail stores come with codes that you can redeem for a digital (streamable) copy. In the past, you had multiple online stores where you could redeem codes, which could cause your library to get splintered across multiple apps and websites -- Ultraviolet, the Apple movie store, and Vudu, itself. Movies Anywhere (MA) is a service provided by the major film studios to get all of your redeemed content back under one roof, either in the MA app itself, or integrated into a third-party app, as is the case with Amazon Video. Now if, for example, you redeemed a movie on the Apple store but you no longer have an iOS device, you can load up Vudu or the MA app on your Android device and be able to watch those movies again.
Cons
iOS does not allow purchase or rental within the app: While you can watch all the movies that you've obtained by redeeming Blu-ray codes, and you can rent or purchase on the Vudu website to watch within the app, there currently is no way to buy or rent within the app, itself, which greatly impacts practicality and overall appeal. The Vudu app for Apple TV also does not let you buy or rent, indicating that the deciding factor is strategic, not technical.
Vudu To Go Download Location
We did not encounter this restriction when testing on an Android device.
4K can be pricier and inconsistent: Where Vudu does offer 4K, there is a moderate premium (as there is with other competing movie stores). But Apple doesn't charge extra for this, so the more economical choice in the long run may be to buy 4K movies directly from them, to watch on an Apple TV 4K, despite the device's relatively high purchase price. If you're a movie buff, Apple's streaming box can pay for itself before long.
The Vudu versions of 4K movies can also sometimes be missing features, such as HDR or Dolby Vision, when such features are available for the same movies on other services. So you have to check for the HDR and Dolby logos before deciding where to buy, especially if you're paying extra to get the 4K stream.
Vudu
Bottom Line
How To Rent From Vudu
Vudu's selection should be varied enough for most users, the app is easy to navigate, and you probably already own at least one method of getting a movie from your phone to your TV. But Apple's apparent blockade on in-app purchases or rentals cuts into Vudu's appeal and prevents it from being the one-stop movie shop that it should be.