Netflix’s advertising subscription still has a difficult time with subscribers. The streaming service now wants to improve this with some far-reaching changes.
Netflix introduced its advertising subscription in November 2022. Since then, it hasn’t been overly well received by subscribers. The launch flopped, even allowing advertisers to claim their money back. Netflix is now making some adjustments to its latest subscription model in order to attract more viewers to the cheaper offer. However, this also makes another subscription significantly less attractive.
Netflix promotional subscription with some changes
Netflix has presented its figures for the second quarter of 2023 and linked them directly to the announcement of some changes. Overall, things are going better in 2023 than in the previous year for the streaming service, which was struggling with falling subscription numbers in the first half of 2022. In response, Netflix announced several actions. On the one hand, the service wants to fight the widespread “account sharing” with additional fees. On the other hand, the advertising subscription was introduced. The new model costs less than the other tariffs. For this, the subscribers are shown advertising proportionately and not all content of the usual subscriptions is included – not even all Netflix originals.
In addition, subscribers to the advertising tariff have to live with the lower HD resolution and can only use one stream. At least that’s what Netflix wants to change now. The quality is to be upgraded to Full HD this month and the maximum number of streams is to be increased to two. Netflix apparently wants to make the advertising subscription more attractive – for its users and thus also for advertising customers.
Is the Netflix basic subscription without ads still worth it?
Upgrading the model with advertising also means devaluing the next tariff: the basic subscription. Users currently pay EUR 7.99 per month for this version. Although you have access to content, the stream is also only in HD and only one person can access the platform. With the advertising subscription, there is now better quality and more scope for 4.99 euros – except in the area of content. For many, that should also be the decisive argument for the basic subscription without advertising.
Deadline for account sharing fee further postponed
In addition, Netflix announced at the same time that the introduction of fees for so-called “account sharing” will be postponed further. That should please many subscribers, because they actually share current polls according to many of their streaming accounts with each other. Netflix, on the other hand, is hoping for increasing revenue from the fees. According to estimates, it costs the streaming service well every year $9 billion, that so many use Netflix but don’t pay for it regularly.
In some countries there are already additional fees. A start in March 2023 was planned for many other countries, including Germany. However, this has not yet been implemented. Netflix has now announced that it will launch in a broader range of countries in the second quarter of 2023. That still sounds quite vague and points to a start towards the end of the quarter in June. For Germany, we can assume that fees similar to those in Spain will be charged for sub-accounts, namely 5.99 euros.
This means that such an additional account is more expensive than the advertising subscription, which costs EUR 4.99. With this measure, Netflix seems to want to attract more users to the subscription with advertising.