Betamax

Cause of death

Killed by a successor

Made by

Sony

VHS offered longer recording time, and length beat picture quality decisively.

Betamax is the standard shorthand for a better product losing, though the reality is more that Sony optimised for image quality while JVC optimised for how long a tape could record, and consumers wanted the whole film on one cassette. Sony lost the consumer market by the late 1980s but kept manufacturing cassettes for four more decades, finally stopping in 2016. The format outlived its own defeat by roughly thirty years.

Replaced by VHS.