and the disks are only used for entitlements, not for the game. when you stick the disk in, the game is downloaded.

Why is this downvoted it’s exactly how it works, you can see in the UI that the game is downloaded when you insert a disk, and you can’t play until the download completes.

	▲	K3UL 8 hours ago \| parent \| next [-]
		When you insert a disk, the game gets COPIED to the hard drive, not downloaded. Some games need additional downloads or patches that they will download, but that's up to the editors. Nothing is preventing them from releasing a finished game that fits on a disc (with some exceptions for some huge AAA games that won't fit, of course)
	▲	wmf 20 hours ago \| parent \| prev \| next [-]
		If the PS5 is offline it will install the game from disc. If it's online it will auto-download patches (which may be the entire game).
	▲	Hamuko 19 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61m1e4Jjick