It probably should not be a surprise to anyone that Netflix is aware that some people share their Netflix subscription with people who live outside of their household. In response, Netflix is in the process of cracking down on that practice.
Soon, Netflix users will be required to pay more to share their account with a person who doesn’t live in their household. That cost is on top of the person’s Netflix subscription.
Netflix provided the following information on their website, in a post titled: “Paying to Share Netflix Outside Your Household”. It was written by Chengyi Long.
We’ve always made it easy for people who live together to share their Netflix account, with features like separate profiles and multiple streams in our Standard and Premium plans. While these have been hugely popular, they have also created some confusion about when and how Netflix can be shared. As a result, accounts are being shared between households – impacting our ability to invest in great new TV and films to our members.
Netflix continued by clarifying: “So for the last year we’ve been working on ways to enable members who share outside their households to do so easily and securely, while also paying a bit more.”
This new “pay more” effort is going to be launched and tested out over the next few weeks for Netflix users in Chile, Costa Rica, and Peru.
One new “feature” is called Add Extra Member. “Members on our Standard and Premium plans will be able to add sub accounts for up to two people they don’t live with – each with their own profile, personalized recommendations, login, and password.” Netflix listed the prices for people in each of the countries they are starting with.
The other new “feature” is called Transfer a Profile to a New Account. “Members on our Basic, Standard, and Premium plans can enable people who share their account to transfer profile information either to a new account or an Extra Member sub account – keeping the viewing history, My List, and personalized recommendations.”
Variety reported that, in the three test markets, Netflix will start notifying members who share their account outside the household about the new options. Netflix will notify members who share their account outside their household to verify their account if a device outside of their home logs into the account. Netflix will then ask the user to verify the login from the device by sending a verification code.
To me, it sounds like Netflix is about to push people who are sharing their account with someone whom they don’t live with to make some tough choices. Some friends and family might be understanding, and transfer their profile to a new account (which they will pay for). Others might hold a grudge when their “freebie” Netflix subscription becomes inactive.