Netflix has a plan to take care of rampant account sharing: a program that lets subscribers pay further to share their account with individuals exterior their family.
The streaming big launched paid sharing in Canada, New Zealand, Portugal and Spain on Wednesday. It was beforehand rolled out in a number of markets in Latin America.
While Netflix gained’t say when paid sharing will come to different international locations, some model of the plan is anticipated to be launched within the U.S. within the subsequent few weeks. Around one-third of Netflix’s subscribers dwell within the U.S. and Canada.
Netflix has greater than 231 million paid subscribers in 190 international locations. The Los Gatos, California-based firm estimates that 100 million households are at the moment sharing their accounts with others, which impacts the corporate’s potential to spend money on new programming.
“We’ve all the time made it straightforward for individuals who dwell collectively to share their Netflix account with options like profiles and a number of streams,” the company said in a blog post Wednesday. “While these have been hugely popular, they’ve also created confusion about when and how you can share Netflix.”
Netflix mentioned it’ll enable commonplace and premium subscribers in Canada, Spain, New Zealand and Portugal to arrange an additional account for as much as two individuals they don’t dwell with for an additional month-to-month price. The month-to-month price varies by nation; in Canada, it’s 7.99 Canadian {dollars}, whereas in Portugal it’s 3.99 euros.
Netflix mentioned it’ll additionally enable individuals who have been borrowing accounts to switch their viewing historical past and different preferences to a brand new, paid subscription.
Netflix didn’t say what actions it’ll take if subscribers proceed to share accounts exterior their family. In a convention name with traders in January, Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters mentioned the corporate is attempting to be considerate and gradual in its rollout.
“It’s worth noting that this will not be a universally popular move, so there will be current members that are unhappy with this move. We’ll see a bit of a cancel reaction to that,” he mentioned. “We think of this as similar to what we see when we raise prices.”
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