Top Ten DVD Players

Philips DVP5100 Multiregion

Sony DVPNS30 Multiregion

Yamaha DVD-S557

Panasonic DVD-S49

JVC XV-N322S

Goodmans GDVD150

Panasonic DVD-S29

Toshiba SD-150E2

Pioneer DV-380-S Multiregion

Sony DVP-NS29S

DVD player models and capabilities change frequently.

UK-DVD-Rental-Guide.com is not responsible for any losses resulting from the information provided (see Disclaimer). If you do spot a discrepancy, please email us and we'll update the site.

DVD Player Buyer Guide/Table Definitions

There's a bewildering array of DVD players on the UK market, and just as we review DVD rental companies, we've launched this brief buyer's guide to DVD players, particularly for our visitors who want to upgrade for better performance. DVD player prices have plummeted in recent years, and even the cheaper ones offer fairly good quality (better than a even a premium VCR), though there certainly is a significant improvement if you pay a bit more. Our rankings (based on personal experience as well as a survey of various fora and information sources across the web) take into account the following features:

Price: This is the standard price on Amazon.co.uk, source of some of the best buys and free shipping on 20 pound+ orders, which is very useful for heavy DVD player orders.

Picture Quality: Again, there is not much difference between a high and low ranking these days, but with a high-end television you should certainly be able to notice the difference.

Sound Quality: Also not much difference among the models in their sound quality.

Ease of Use: Some machine are more complicated than others; high ranks here indicate simple, industry standard setups, buttons, remotes, and onscreen menus. We also penalize models here which have above average customer complaints on various online fora.

Plays MP3, JPEG discs: All players play the standard, pre-recorded DVD format, but some will play these other formats.

Resume: This is a very useful function; if fact we wouldn't consider buying a DVD player without it after our bad experience with our next-to-last one. This allows you to turn the machine on and continue from where you left off, rather than skipping ahead to find where you left off.

Multiregion: You may want the flexibility of a multi-region DVD player that will play discs from around the world, otherwise a Region 2 player will only play European discs. With multiregion, if you see a cheap American disc on ebay for instance, perhaps something not released in the UK yet, you can order and play it.