Netflix have confirmed details of a new membership tier that will include adverts and come at a lower subscription fee.
The move comes after a drop in Netflix’s stock price and a fall in subscriber numbers earlier this year. Now the streaming service is also looking to change the way it releases new series.
Here’s all you need to know about the new membership tier with adverts.
How much will the new Netflix membership cost?
The ‘Basic with adverts’ package, which launches on November 3 at 4pm, will cost £4.99 a month in the UK and $6.99 in the US.
Netflix’s existing three membership tiers are ‘Basic’ for £6.99 per month, ‘Standard’ for £10.99 per month and ‘Premium’ (£15.99 per month). So a Netflix viewer switching from ‘Basic’ to ‘Basic with adverts’ will save around £24 a year, while viewers switching from ‘Standard’ to the new tier will save £72.
Which countries will Netflix launch advert membership in?
Netflix will launch the new membership tier in 12 countries next month, with plans to expand to other territories in the future.
Alongside the US and UK, it’s coming to Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico and Spain.
Netflix says that it ‘expects to launch in more countries over time’ as they ‘learns from and improves the experience.’
What’s the catch?
While Netflix subscribers on the new plan will save a bit of money, there won’t be as many movies and TV series to watch, which the platform is attributing to licensing issues.
The image quality will also be slightly reduced and subscribers on the new advert tier won’t be able to download content to their devices.
How many minutes of ads will there be on Netflix?
The streamer has confirmed that viewers will be shown five minutes of ads for every hour of content. This is slightly less than commercial TV channels, which usually run an average of seven minutes of ads an hour.
Adverts will be 15 or 30 seconds in length and will play before and during series and films. The ads will be targeted by country and genre, with advertisers able to prevent their ad spots from appearing on content that doesn’t match with their brand.
So is the new Netflix subscription worth it?
The downsides to the new Netflix membership tier means this isn’t quite a bargain after all.
For an extra £2 each month you get a wider choice of content, the ability to download content and an ad-free experience. So if you can afford the extra pennies, the basic ad-free plan is a much better choice, unless Netflix drop the price of this new tier further.