Home cinema, also commonly called home theater, refers to home entertainment systems that seek to reproduce a movie theater experience and mood, with the help of video and audio equipment in or outside a private home. In the 1950s, playing home movies became popular in the United States as Kodak 8 mm film projector equipment became more affordable. The development of multi-channel audio systems and later LaserDisc in the 1980s created a new paradigm for home video. In the early to mid-1990s, a typical home cinema in the United States would have a LaserDisc or VHS player fed to a large rear-projection television set. Some people were using expensive front projectors in a darkened viewing room.

Beginning in the late 1990s, and continuing throughout much of the 2000s, home-theater technology progressed with the development of the DVD-Video format, Dolby Digital 5.1-channel audio ("surround sound") speaker systems, and high-definition television (HDTV). In the 2010s, 3D television technology and Blu-ray Disc have ushered in a new era of home theater once again.

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