This is a simple tip for organizing DVDs and Blu-ray discs. It will clean off your bookshelves and minimize the clutter. If you have shelves, or storage boxes, full of DVDs, this tutorial is for you!
Today I’m going to show you how to organize DVDs and blu-ray discs. Last year I wrote a post on how I organize our living room with our TV console, and everyone saw this picture of our organized DVD collection, and wanted to know how I organized my DVD discs and blu-rays.
So let me back up here for a second. I started writing this post 2 years ago, yes TWO, and never finished it! So all the “before” pictures for this post are from our old house. 🙂 We’ve also bought a lot more movies since then so if I did a before picture now the stack would be twice as tall!
How to organize DVDs
Here’s what you need:
- DVD Sleeves (There are lots of different types available but THESE are the ones I have, I found them on Amazon).
- Scissors
- About 30 minutes, depending on how many DVDs you have
Tutorial:
Here’s what I do when we buy a movie. First I pull the DVDs out and put them in a sleeve. There are 2 slots in the sleeve so if there’s a Blu-ray version and a non-Blu-ray version I can keep both of them together. I also keep movies like Cars 1 and Cars 2 together in the same sleeve.
Then I pull the paper cover out of the original DVD case and cut it to fit the sleeve. I like to save the front cover of the DVDs because it makes it easier to identify the movies when you’re looking through them.
Slide the cover into the sleeve, then slide the DVD sleeve behind it and you’re done!
Here’s what my before and after stack looked like 2 years ago and I guarantee it would be twice as big now! You can tell what stage of life we were in, since we have so many Disney movies. 🙂
Look at the size difference between the original DVD case and the DVD sleeve.
I store mine in two baskets, in our entertainment center, and they are organized by genre. One of the baskets is for kids, and holiday movies, the other is for “grown up” movies. 🙂
Here’s what our DVDs look like now, and we own lots of DVDs! Pretty amazing that 52 DVDs can fit in that small of a space, right?! Now you can own as many DVDs as you’d like because you know how to make them take up less space. 😉
You can also use this trick to organize CDs, if you’re like us, and have lots of CDs saved from when you were a teenager.
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What do you do with the old cases? Do you reuse them in some creative-type fashion or recycle?
I just toss them because I don’t like clutter. I’m not one of those “maybe I’ll use it later” people. 🙂
I think this is a great idea! I will toss the cases, too. Why would you keep them? Isn’t the whole point to make space/de clutter/organize? Keeping them sounds like something you would see on that show “Hoarders”. If throwing away the cases bothers you that much then donate them to a school (primary teachers might have a use for them) or some place like the Salvation Army…or recycle.
i took all my empty cases from cds ( you could do it with dvds too i think) and packed them up for the goodwill. I am one of those earth hugger types that loves the planet and wants to recycle all
I possibly can. I know for a fact that they sell empty cases since I have bought them before. Thanks for the great idea, Anna!
That’s a great idea, thank you for sharing! 🙂
If they’re in good shape and you have more than 10 or 20, you could sell them in a large lot on eBay. Resellers are always looking for cases to replace missing or broken ones. 🙂
That’s a great idea!
I donate mine to the library since their cases get more wear and tear and would rather they spend their money on books, children’s programs or education than replacement cases.
That’s a great idea!
HI Anna, this is a wonderful idea! Love the “less space”…what do you do with the old cases though – just toss? I’m not sure my husband would be up for this idea, as he likes to keep everything. I’m thinking of future when you are purging the movies would you just “move along” the DVD’s in the plastic sleeves? RIght now our movies are overflowing the cabinet I purchased for them, and I recently did a purge! I sure would love to trim the space down!
I need to have “all my ducks in a row” before presenting the idea…..
Thanks for the idea!
I do this as well and it has been an awesome way of reducing the bulk! Can you share where you found the baskets in which the DVDs are sitting?
I think I found them in the dollar bin at Target, years ago. Sorry, I know that’s not really helpful. I’d keep an eye out at Big Lots, the Dollar Tree, all those kinds of places, because they sometimes have cute, inexpensive baskets. 🙂
check out your local goodwill stores for plastic bins. they are usually on the top shelf or have other smaller objects stored inside of them. if it’s not for sale it will be marked…most have a tag on them. I got several (all different sized) for less than $10 for all! I also use them in the refrigerator and freezer as a slide out—much easier than rooting through the back of the fridge to find “lost” items. I also use them as slide out drawers for under the bed to store other items.
I’ve been doing this for a couple of years now. However, I don’t cut the insert; I simply crease it in the middle and slide it in. That way, if I want to give the movie away (I keep a few empty DVD cases around just in case), I can slide a fully intact insert right in.
I have those and love them. We have a ridiculous amount of DVDs and this is the only way we could possibly have enough room. My newest fun is to use a dvd shelf app to organize and keep a list in my phone of what we own.
DVDs are always the hardest to sort and organize because their shape is not a perfect square. Thank you for these tips!! I’m going to pin this to my Pinterest board so I can look back at it later!
I love this idea, Anna! I bought a DVD binder style organizer for my DVDs, but the pages can’t be moved, so when I get a new DVD, i have to reorganize everything to keep them in ABC order! I might switch to your method! Thanks for sharing!
In the pictures, it looks like you are sliding a DVD with the movies inside another sleeve. Am I missing something?
Thank you for your ideas. I love them.
There’s a sleeve for the DVDs that slides into a protector sleeve, which is where I put the front cover. Does that make sense?
I’m late to this discussion, and have found the DVD sleeves on Amazon, but not the ‘protector sleeves’ you mention that the cover art goes into along with the DVD sleeves. They should be c. 5.5″ x 7.5″ as those are the dimensions of a DVD case, but I can’t find same anywhere. 🙁
??
These are the ones I have – https://amzn.to/2w59rYF. Sometimes I have to trim the cover work a little but I’ve always been really happy with these and they are only $10 for 25. 🙂
Just a question…do the DVD’s get scratched in these slip covers? I was going to order some from amazon and the review about scratched up dvd’s scared me out. Any trouble with that?
Thanks.
We haven’t had any trouble with it but we are also very careful with our DVDs. I love the slipcovers! 🙂
I love your idea of storing cd’s and dvd’s ..BUT<<<<those cases that you buy these cd's & dvd's in cost $2.99 plus tax,,You are charged separate for these at many places but at BEST BUY for sure,,(I bought a virus cd, and I never knew I was charged for the case separately until this year 2015,,I was very upset.) WHAT can these be used for??I have racked my brain to find a use for them??? maxine J.
they would make excellent protectors to mail photos in?
I would not want to store these cases insiude my house after organizing my dvc’s and cd’s..but that is a lot of money throwed away..,,Sorry i forget to add this to my first comment..maxine
The inserts have slots for 2 DVD’s, right? For individual movies, have you found a way to utilize both slots and have both covers in the sleeve, or does that extra slot just go to waste in that case? We have a TON of DVD’s, so I’m trying to figure out how to utilize these in the most cost effective way. 🙂
Some of our movies just have one DVD in the slip but if it’s a series then I put both of the DVDs in one slip. We also have a Blue-ray player so a lot of our DVDs come with a Blue-ray version and a regular version so I keep both of them in the slip together. Hope that helps. 🙂
I just ordered some of these off of Amazon and I am so excited to get rid of some of my clutter before I move! Also it is a good compromise with my husband who insists we keep all the covers!
Yay! You will be so happy with the amount of space you’ll save! 🙂
This idea is perfect! I just have one question, I noticed you have two different sleeves you use, one for the dvd’s and one for the covers, that you then put together. You said you got the DVD sleeves at Target. But what type of sleeve is the other one? (the one you put the dvd covers in)?
Thankyou! 🙂
Hi, Ellayna! I’m Anna’s assistant, Bethany. The second The outer sleeve actually comes with the pack of sleeves, so both will be in the pack you buy. Hope this helps! 🙂
Great suggestion! I didn’t want to cut the DVD covers, so I folded them in half to create a middle crease. Then I matched the edges and folded the middle crease to hide it…kind of like an accordion fold. Hope that helps anyone else who wants to keep the DVD cover description intact.
Good idea!
Hi Anna how whould you Organize a collection of over 1 thousand dvds and Vhs tapes. and some bluray. in a small space. any ideas whould be nice. thanks for your time
Hi, Dwayne! I’m Anna’s assistant, Bethany. Over 1,000 DVDs is a lot to organize! Anna wrote a great post about how she fits all of her DVDs into a small space here: https://askannamoseley.com/2015/01/how-to-organize-dvds/. Hope this helps!
When my kids were little and they had a lot of preschool/early elementary computer games on CDs, I took them all out of cases and put them in CD binders. It was much easier to find the one we needed and easy for the kids to flip through and pick one to play. I also took all the Playstation games and put them in a DVD binder. I think it had room for the covers too. That was particularly useful when my son would want to take his games to a friends to play. They were nicely protected and easy to transport. I really should either do a binder or these sleeves for the DVDs. They take a ton of room and we rarely use the physical media now anyways.
what is the 2nd sleeve you are using… what are the called exactly?
Hi, Carla. I’m Anna’s assistant, Bethany. The sleeves are by a company called Atlantic and they are called movie sleeves. There are 25 in the pack that Anna featured in her photos and you can purchase them at Target, Amazon, or Home Depot. Here is the link for them at Target:http://www.target.com/p/movie-sleeves-w-double-disc-insert/-/A-12300262#prodSlot=medium_1_46 Hope this helps!
ok thank you but what is the sleeve that she is using to slide the cover in by the pictures it looks like she is using one sleeve (movie sleeve) for the dvd’s then she is sliding the cover and the dvd into another sleeve that is the sleeve im looking for.
never mind I just figured it out thank you.
Thanks for the great tip! I was a little nervous about getting rid of the cases, but I used this for my 135 DVDs and posted to my new blog. I couldn’t believe I had that many DVDs in my house! I took all my cases to the local recycling center and felt really good about it! LOL
Wow, what a difference! Thank you for coming back to tell me, so I could see your results, I love it when my readers do that. 🙂
I was going to order some of these on Amazon myself, but when I started reading reviews, it seems a lot of people have had issues with them scratching their discs. Have you noticed this issue in your own experience? Thanks!
No, I haven’t had any problems and we’ve been using them for years. Having said that though, I am very careful when I remove the disk from the sleeve and I never let the little kids do it. 🙂
It’s always nice to condense things into a smaller space. Then you can get more stuff!
Your response to Rachel asking what you would do with the old cases was disappointing.
“I just toss them.” you said. Really? PLEASE RECYCLE!
Any ideas for dvd series sets?
It depends on how many are in the set but what I’ve done is put 2 DVDs in each slip (there are two slots on each one) and then I put them in one cover together. Does that make sense?
I lost you. Where does the second (larger) sleeve come from? The one you put the DVD cover into? Thanks. Love this idea (if I can figure it out)
Hi, Jan! I’m Anna’s assistant, Bethany. The outer sleeve you’re referring to–the one that she inserted the DVD cover into–actually comes with the pack of sleeves. There is an inner sleeve with two slots for placing one or two DVDs and then one outer sleeve where the DVDs and the cover slide into. Hope I explained that in a way that makes sense! 🙂
Why not rip them onto a hard drive? Almost no space needed at all.
I ordered 1 pack from Amazon a few days ago. Today I ordered 2 more packs. (I’m sure I’ll be ordering more in the future.) This is the best idea ever! & of course I recycled the empty cases! Thank you for posting!
Awesome!!! You’re going to be SO glad you did it, it’s crazy how much space it saves!!! 🙂
Thank you for writing this blog! We just bought a house and I am trying to organize my DVDs so I didnt need a large bookcase for them. This is great since I can put most of my DVDs in these sleeves but keep a small amount in their cases. I will be keeping my Disney DVDs in cases since they are worth more that way 😀