Blu-ray is an optical disc format that can store high-definition video and large amounts of data. It has progressed through different generations including CD, DVD, and is now the third generation Blu-ray disc, which uses a blue-violet laser to read data at a high transfer rate of 36 Mbps from 25/50 GB discs. Blu-ray has advantages over DVDs like not suffering from issues like birefringence and disc tilt, and has features like recording HD TV and accessing online content.