Can You Watch Your DVD While Overseas?

We got this message when we tried to play a DVD in the DVD player that was in the apartment rental in Nice, France. My friend brought Blue-Ray DVD’s and for some reason I thought the technology was different which would enable American DVD’s to be played overseas. It’s not.

DVD’s from each continent have a regional code. If you look on the back of any DVD cover, normally towards the bottom, you will see a small number. Sometimes that number is on top of a globe inside of a square with the letters NTSC either next to it or beneath it (you will have the letters PAL if you are in Europe).

North American DVD’s are region 1, Europe is region 2. If you don’t have a DVD player that is a multiple region player, you won’t be able to watch your DVD’s in another country and you will get something similar to the picture above.

This is the first time I have encountered this because most of the time the apartment rentals have DVD’s provided or I watch movies on my laptop. So if you want to watch movies while you are relaxing in your apartment rental, feel free to ask if the apartment comes with any DVD’s for you to use, if that is important to you.