BetaMax was a standard format for video tapes that directly competed with VHS. It's usually considered superior for video quality, and (apparently) is widely used still in the professional TV industry, however it's practically never seen in the home market as it was originally intended.

BetaMax had a few disadvantages to VHS:

• Tapes were shorter often only holding an hour of footage.
• Sony owned the IP for BetaMax, where in comparison VHS was a relatively open standard.

BetaMax had a few advantages:

• Tapes were smaller, and therefore easier to move around
• Tapes were of higher quality.

However, in the end BetaMax "lost" and VHS became the de facto standard for home video recording.

A lot of discussions about competing technologies often refer to BetaMax vs VHS.

CategoryOffTopic (wildly)