Netflix ends password sharing for US subscribers
THE streaming giant sent an email on Tuesday to US members who share their account with people living outside their household, making it clear that it would start kicking people out of the service if they use someone’s account for more than 30 days while they were at another location.
For households willing to pay for an additional person to access their account, Netflix said it would charge an additional $7.99 per person. Otherwise, he said, it would encourage those users to create an account themselves. (Netflix allows users to transfer their existing profiles to a new account to save their algorithm.)
The news was not a surprise. More than a year ago, in April 2022, the company announced its first loss of subscribers in 10 years, attributing the decline, in part, to changing economic forces as well as increased competition from other streaming services. He said at the time that he would look for ways to increase his revenue, including adding a cheaper tier of advertising and cracking down on password sharing between households. Netflix estimated that 100 million people worldwide access their streaming service without paying.
Netflix now offers a variety of pricing options, ranging from $6.99 per month at the low end for an ad-supported version, to $19.99 per month at the high end for a version that does not include advertisements and allows subscribers to add two more members for an additional $7.99 per month, per person.
Some Netflix subscribers took to Twitter to express their displeasure with the new policy, noting that the company had encouraged users to share their passwords with others for years.
But that was a different time, when Netflix ruled as the only streaming service in town. Now consumers have a plethora of choices, from Disney+ to Warner Bros. Discovery just launched Max to Peacock and Paramount+ and many more. And Netflix’s push to generate more revenue per subscriber comes as many consumers are feeling the economic pressure of inflation. With the new policy also occurring amid the writers’ strike, some influential writers were encouraging users to cancel their Netflix accounts in solidarity with the writers. Still, the displeasure is not unexpected by Netflix. The company has spent the last year testing the strategy in smaller markets like Canada, New Zealand, Spain and Portugal.
