What's the difference between DVD-R and DVD+R?

They are actually very simillar.

DVD-R:
A write-once format that is compatible with many existing DVD Players, Recorders and DVD-ROM drives. Can only be used in DVD Recorders and Burners that support DVD-R recording or multi-format recording (drives that record "plus" or "dash"). Holds 4.7GB of data or video. Typically, it can hold 2 hours of MPEG-2 video on standard (SP) speed setting.

DVD+R
Another write-once recordable DVD format developed seperate from DVD-R. These discs are basically the same as DVD-R discs. They hold 4.7GB of data or video and are compatible with most DVD Players and DVD-ROM drives. They can only be used in DVD Recorders and Burners that support DVD+R or multi-format recorders.

to see other types of dvd formats you might be intrested in:
http://dvr.about.com/od/dvdrecordableformats/f/faq4.htm

Well this was quite a read! Good to know some folks know how to find Wiki and learned to copy/paste information into a blog (snore), some give info that looks like they opened a web page, took 5 steps back from their monitor and threw a dart at it, while a few laid down some worthy opinions and facts, but heaven help anyone who was hoping to find an answer to the question they could hang their hat on and filter the "inaccuracies". I don't have all the answers either, but have spent hundreds and hundreds of hours ripping, decrypting, editing, shrinking and burning in most every format with most every disc brand, I have some experience. Still humble enough to consider myself a novice though, it's a complex topic. The answers are in here, but with many questionable additions. First, the plus or minus have no relevancy on what's been oft stated here, that plus is better for data, minus for video. The only reason minus is better is it's more widely accepted by dvd players PERIOD! That's what we're really after in this topic, all things being equal (and for all intents and purposes they are) minus R is better because it plays on almost all name brand players manufactured in recent years. Someone also said players that don't play DVD plus are really old ones and you should ditch your player?, well I have a $700 Denon to tell you that's hogwash. Also, whoever said you can't burn movies (commercial or otherwise) on these discs hasn't tried to rip and burn a movie for about 8 years! There are literally dozens of software programs, almost all free shareware or 30 day trial that will copy a movie you bought yesterday from Walmart. I could teach a Chimp to do it with a few bananas. Decrypting a Disney movie can be a challenge for the inexperienced, but all can be done, it's only complicated when you edit menus and compress them, stuff like that. Got VHS? My 3 year old could decrypt them, rip them to a DVD- and chuck the tape with a device called an Easycap, about $12 on Ebay. Go to Afterdawn.com and use the search engine, you'll learn things LucasFilm probably just figured out. Remember guys, everything is hard to do till you know how, then it's a walk in the park. DVD- owns the "Lions Share" of the market, the "War" has been waged and the battle won years ago. Don't forget not to buy cheap discs, taiyo Yuden or Verbatim if you don't want skipping, pausing, failed burns, quality is everything and cheap discs give you bad burns. Just my 1.5 cents

DVD+Recordable defines a standard for recordable DVD drives and media defined by the DVDRW Alliance. Often called "plus R", the format is write once (compared to DVD+RW which can be erased and rewritten). The single sided discs can hold 4,700,000,000 bytes (4.38 Gigabytes at 1024 bytes to the kilobyte) with double sided discs holding twice as much. There are no dual layer single sided recordable discs. This format competes with the DVD Forum DVD-R specification. DVDR help DVDR information.

DVD-Recordable defines a standard for recordable DVD drives and media defined by the DVD Forum. Often called "minus R", the format is write once (compared to DVD-RW wich can be erased and rewritten). The single sided discs can hold 4,700,000,000 bytes (4.38 Gigabytes at 1024 bytes to the kilobyte) with double sided discs holding twice as much. There are no dual layer single sided recordable discs. This format competes with the DVD+R format.

DvD-R: Write once, better for Video as widely accepted by home DvD players.

DvD+R: Write once BUT data can be added later (not RW, but still accessible). Better for data as most Computer DvD players can read it and you can fill half the disk, then add a quarter, and the complete it a year later (as an example).

Hope that helped.

i have read quite a few of ur amswers, im nt a comp wiz but i do belive that DVD+R's are better for storing data, i.e. backing up your photo's, and that DVD-R's are better for burning movies, i had used a dvd+r to record a film and played it in my dvd player and some times its ok but other times it will skip and jump back in chapters and so on, burned the same film to a DVD-R and playback was fine. all i buy now is DVD-R's as you can do everything without a problem so i would recomed to just use DVD-R's.
one other thing is that i found with the DVD+R i could erase and re-write on the disc even tho its not an RW ?:S?

Nobody cares about the different forums and alliances and all those useless facts about dates and development.

DVD-R is supposed to be slightly better for movies.

DVD+R is supposed to be slightly better for data.

I have been told that these slight advantages have something to do with the way the drive organizes the information on the disc in either format. In simplicity, DVD-R writes in sort of a continuous fashion better for reading video, while DVD+R sort of scatters the information around on the disc in a way that is better for the drive to process data.

I can't honestly back this up because I don't know if it is correct, but this answer makes the most sense if it is true. Hopefully a computer genius can edit this answer if it is wrong, but maintain the basic idea of my response--to actually define a difference in the two formats for a consumer who is buying single-layered, blank media to use with a DVD burner that will write on either type. I think that's what we want to know!

I did some searching and DVD+R seem to be better for data and DVD Video Burning, and also last longer in years so they are better for your photo and Camcorder back up etc. Here is a Web Page to look at. Towards the botom of the web page the Author explains about DVD+R Being Better.
www.adterrasperaspera.com/blog/2006/10/30/how-to-choose-cddvd-archival-media

lets put it simple. a +R will not work in ALL older dvd recorder nor older dvd players. -r will work on all players and all recorders. :) unless ur positive u that ur computers burner supports +R leave it alone. get a pack of -r. as for tech answer. there is none they both write data in a very simliar form. the difference is too small to notice. this is just a older bluray and hddvd problem but the + and - R problem has now been solved with modern day players and recorders. cheers. (^.^)

a dvd-r has a minus sign on it and a dvd+r has a plus sign. haha go steelers!!!

Also I remember there was a differance in the way the data was written to the disk. -R is one continious stream and +R is broken into sectors and tracks.
I may be mistaken I have not thought about that for years.

Well I came here to find the answer as well. I started backing up movies about two years ago, and was always using +R. I have a pioneer up-converting DVD player which supports both -R and +R formats. The problem I am running into is, while watching a movie burned on the +R format, it often freezes, skips, and sometimes can't continue to read the disk, a problem that is intermittent. If I make it all the way through a movie burned on +R without this happening, I feel lucky.

Oddly, I can sometimes watch a +R disk with no problems, while at other times the same disk freeze and skip. Also, if I loan a disk to a friend or family member, if it was burned on +R, they often cannot watch it, or have the same problem with it freezing. I never have any of these problem with the ones burned on -R. I realize, a lot of people still have older DVD players that do not support the +R format, but mine does, and I still have problems with it.

Granted, I am backing up movies and not other types of data, and as previously mentioned, -R seems to be better for movies, and +R for data.

I have been finding that I am better off going back through and re-burning stuff from the +R disks to the -R. If I am watching a +R, and it starts to skip. I simply pop it into my computer and burn it right from the +R disk on to a -R, problem solved. I am a little ticked that I have wasted so much time and money on the +R format, but what can you do.

"What is the difference between DVD-R/RW and DVD+R/RW?

The truth is that the two competing technologies use different formats. No single company "owns" DVD and both technologies have their "champions".

DVD-R/RW was developed by Pioneer. Based on CD-RW technology, it uses a similar pitch of the helix, mark length of the 'burn' for data, and rotation control. DVD-R/RW is supported by the DVD Forum, an industry-wide group of hardware and software developers, and computer peripheral manufacturers. The DVD-R format has been standardized in ECMA-279 by the Forum, but this is a private standard, not an 'industry' ISO standard like the CD-R/RW Red Book or Orange Book standard.

DVD+R/RW is also based on CD-RW technology. DVD+R/RW is supported by Sony, Philips, HP, Dell, Ricoh, Yamaha, and others, and has recently been endorsed by Microsoft. DVD+R/RW is not supported by the DVD Forum, but the Forum has no power to set industry standards, so it becomes a market-driven issue."
Source and further information:
http://www.plextor.com/english/support/faqs/G00015.htm

Further information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DVD

DVD+RW can supposedly be written to reliably more times than DVD-RW, although I don't know if there is any big difference between the write once version of those formats.

In regards to the

Technical Answer

DVD+R is a dvd disc that allows multiple layers for one disc where as DVD-R only allows one layer....

This sounds like DVD-R disk a single layer only, and DVD+R are both single and dual layers.

If so, check out this link: http://www.pioneer.co.jp/press/release125.html

+r better to watch porn on, -r better for horror.

Not one of the eighteen answers preceding this, actually gives me what I want to know. The fact that one lot of manufacturers support -R and another lot support +R
does not answer the question and the fact that -RW and +RW versions can be rewritten is obvious but irrelevant. There was a complete technical answer which made sense, given in one of the Video magazines a few years ago and it is in my archives somewhere. When I can find it I will put the details on the forum but in the meantime I remember that the difference between the types was mainly in the editability and erasability.

Delboy

+R discs have newer and better error correction schemes than -R disks.

The tracker line on an empty DVD+R has better signal-to-noise ratio than DVD-R.

I preffer +R discs for backup.

Found at: http://www.build-your-own-computer-tips.com/dvd-drive-differences.html

There’s DVD+R, DVD+RW, DVD-R, DVD-RW, and even DVD-ROM! So what’s the difference between all of these different names, aren’t all DVDs the same? Well, it’s not quite that simple.

Let’s first start with the most obvious difference: some have R and some have RW. The “R” stands for recordable, while the “W” stands for rewriteable.

The main difference between DVD-R and DVD-RW, or DVD+R and DVD+RW is that the R disc formats can only be written to once, and then it is only readable and can’t be erased for the rest of its digital life. While RW discs are can be written to and erased many times, they are both readable and writeable.

“R” discs are perfect if they are only needed to be written to once, such as giving some files to a friend or transferring them between PCs. “RW” discs have their strength in the ability to be used many times over, which is great for routine system backups, etc. And naturally, the RW discs are slightly more expensive than the R discs, but you’ll have to decide if the trade offs are worth the money.

Now, onto the difference between DVD-R and DVD+R. As I just described above, DVD-R & DVD-RW are sister discs, the difference being one is writeable once, while the other is writeable multiple times. The same thing is true for DVD+R & DVD+RW. So the question is, what’s the difference between the plus and minus?

In order to explain this we must take a trip back in time. When DVDs were first being developed, there was no industry standard. Multiple companies were competing to develop what they hoped would be the dominant form of the future.

The DVD-R DVD+R difference can easily be summarized by the following:

* The DVD-R/RW standard was developed by Pioneer, and is used primarily by Apple and Pioneer. These “minus“ discs can only be written to in one layer on the discs surface. In addition, this format is supported by the DVD forum, but is in no way an industry standard. DVD-R/RW discs are cheaper than the “plus” format.

* The DVD+R/RW format is supported by Philips, Dell, Sony, HP, and Microsoft. These discs can be written to in multiple layers, giving them slightly better and more disc storage than the “minus“ format. Because of this additional capacity, they are slightly more expensive than “minus“ discs.

A couple final things to clear up is the difference between DVD-ROM and DVD+RW, or the other DVD formats I mentioned above. The DVD-ROM drive can only read DVDs, while the other DVD drives can read and write data to DVDs.

And naturally the DVD+RW CD+RW difference can be explained by the “DVD” or “CD” prefix. DVDs, on average, can store up to 4.7 GB of data, while a CD can only store about 700 MB of data, or about 15% of a DVD’s capacity. While CDs are slightly cheaper, in my opinion, the benefits of DVDs are much greater.

So now that you’ve learned about the difference between DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, DVD+RW, and even DVD-ROM, which one is right for you? The easiest way to determine which is more beneficial is to watch the industry trends. A few years ago all pre-built computers were shipping with DVD-ROM drives. Today, most PCs have a burnable DVD drive.

I feel that the benefits of having a burnable DVD drive far outweigh any additional costs. They store much more data, and they are ideal for storing your home movies to watch on your DVD player.

My advice is to look at DVD burners that support all of the major formats I’ve mentioned above, DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, and DVD+RW. While a DVD drive that supports all of these formats may be slightly more expensive, it will allow you to use any type of DVD disc to burn to, and you’ll be protected from any industry shifts to one format or the other.

All of you Missed the point DvD-R are better used for Video Rec. DvD+r are More used for DATA. If your going to be making a DvD Video Use DvD-R if your useing it for storage use DvD+R

DVD-R is single layer
DVD+R is double layer

Since DVD+R is double layer, they do better error check. It is better to store data, backup.

Since DVD-R is single layer, dvd player doesn't have to switch layer, so it doesn't have to pause a second on video. It is better for video.

Unless you have a latest dvd home player, it has large memory buffer, then it doesn't matter. when it switch layers, you won't see any pause.

I just need to know what the "F" do i use to burn a movie or copy a movie on to...a -R or a +R .....that simple........

Negligible if you have a multiburner +R came before –R and some devices will only read these specific discs but for compys it’s nothing much

The main difference between the plus and dash is compatability.This compatability really shows up on stand alone players/game consoles/and other pc drives.
Some of the older DVD-RW drives only record in plus or dash only.

Newer DVD-RW drives are dual format,so you have a lot more flexibility to finding the format your players prefer.

Compatabilty on Dvd burners: The DVD-RW drive that burned those backups,should be able to play those backups. After the burn,those backups are usually going to be played in tv dvd players/x-box/ps2/and maybe friends/family pcs and stand alones.

The formula is simple:
(DVD-R)-(DVD+R)= DVD
After all.. it is all DVDs but users should check the DVD player's compatability.

Francisco Oreta
Sultan Qaboos University
Oman

DVD-R/+R/-RW/+RW...these are all global conspiracies. Bilderberg, Illuminati, New World Order ... all are involved. You do not believe me? It is because "they" do not want you to know the truth!

Ask Alex Jones. Listen to Kevin Trudeau; he will tell you the same thing for $19.95+S&H. Buy Jack van Impe DVDs (either +R or -R).

A DVD-R is a write-once format: once you've burned the data onto that DVD platter, the disk is forever frozen with that information.
While A DVD+R is used to write as well as erase.Means its a re-writable DVD

Share your answer...

http://www.umbc.edu/oit/sans/helpdesk/articles/Diff_DVD_formats.html has all the information you need.

Let me get this straight. -R is the best to record movies and +R is best to record data. Older DVD players only play the -R format and only the newer DVD players can play the +R. Seems pretty simple to me which one to burn movies onto to play on our home DVD players, drum roll please!...

The -R.

........of course that is being a touch shallow. The question should be rephrased as ''WHY is there a difference between DVD+r and DVD-r'' otherwise one could suggest that the difference it is because that they are spelt differently.

These “minus“ discs can only be written to in one layer on the discs surface.

The “plus” can be written to in multiple layers, giving them slightly better and more disc storage than the “minus“ format.

Some of the answers above might as well state ''because DVD+r and DVD-r are spelt differently''. The question should be phrased 'why are they different'.

Politics.

One has cheap disks and expensive drives, the other has cheap drives and expensive disks. (I mean for writing - all drives can read both formats)

better performance of dvd+r for recording as compared to dvd-r.................

DVD-R/RW was developed by Pioneer. Based on CD-RW technology, it uses a similar pitch of the helix, mark length of the 'burn' for data, and rotation control.The DVD-R format has been standardized in ECMA-279 by the Forum, but this is a private standard, not an 'industry' ISO standard like the CD-R/RW Red Book or Orange Book standard.


DVD R/RW is also based on CD-RW technology. DVD R/RW is supported by Sony, Philips, HP, Dell, Ricoh,Yamaha, and others, and has recently been endorsed by Microsoft. DVD R/RW is not supported by the DVD Forum, but the Forum has no power to set industry standards, so it becomes a market-driven issue.

IS DVD+RW only used for Videos and DVD-RW for DATA