Now that HD-DVD is out of the picture, the more formidable (and less certain) format war is now in full swing -- Blu-ray vs. DVD. And Nielson Videoscan has begun tracking the Blu-ray unit sales against the DVD sales. On The Digital Bits' front page, this now replaces the line that used to update readers on HD-DVD's market share versus Blu-ray.

For the week ending June 1, Blu-ray now has a 10% market share with DVD at 90%. IIRC, this is close to the DVD format's market share against VHS at a similar juncture in early-1999. (DVD did not hit 25% market share until 2001, and didn't surpass VHS until 2003.)

Even though the VHS market was tabulated somewhat differently (due to the revenue sharing arrangements the studios had with the major video chains, and the rental pricing windows), this is still a pretty impressive market gain by Blu-ray less than two years in, and with hardware prices still hovering around the $400 mark.

It will be interesting to see how these market share figures change once the price points on Blu-ray players drop closer to $200. It was only when that occurred that the DVD format's market share began to grow rapidly.