Last month, Netflix revealed that it has partnered with Microsoft to offer a lower priced subscription, with ads. A report has emerged which claims that the streaming service's ad-supported plan could start as low as $7 per month.
Image courtesy: Netflix
Netflix had claimed that it lost over a million users since the beginning of the year. It had partially blamed password sharing among users as one of the reasons why its numbers were dropping. The service plans to crackdown on this by offering additional plans at a higher price, to allow users to share their accounts with their friends and family. The new subscriptions, called Netflix Homes, are currently available for users in Argentina, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and the Dominican Republic.
Netflix's ad-supported plan
A report by Bloomberg reveals that Netflix's ad-supported plan will be priced at $7 to $9. In comparison, Netflix's Standard plan costs $15.49 per month, while the Basic one is priced at $9.99.
There has been a rise in the number of streaming services that have introduced ad-supported subscriptions, and it comes as no surprise that Netflix wants to cash in on this.
Here are the prices of ad-supported plans from other streaming services
- Discovery+ - $4.99
- Paramount+ - $4.99
- Peacock Premium -$4.99
- Disney+ with Ads - $7.99
- Hulu - $6.99
- HBO Max - $10
Netflix with ads for $7 a month doesn't sound like a bad deal. The company plans to include four minutes of commercials per hour of playback. That's quite less than what cable networks do, they air ads for 10-20 minutes during shows and movies. The advertisements in Netflix will be shown before and during some shows, but not at the end. This sounds similar to what Paramount+ does, it has promotional interruptions for some shows, where it displays commercials for about 10-15 seconds before resuming the show or movie.
The ads will not be personalized, i.e., Netflix will show the same ads to most people instead of tailored ads. These ads are said to be non-repetitive as well. Kids' shows and Netflix Originals movies won't have ads, though this could change in the future. The service's own TV shows, however, will contain ads. The company is also in talks with its partners, such as Sony, Universal, Warner Bros. and Paramount, to reach an agreement for adding commercials to their old shows and movies.
New TV shows on the other hand will not include advertisements. What this means is that users who subscribe to the ad-supported plan may not have access to the latest shows. This maybe a way for companies to entice users to pay for a higher-priced plan. The ad-supported plan may not support offline viewing, which could be a major disadvantage for people who may prefer to download shows and movies on their devices.
The report states that Netflix's ad-supported plan may be announced in Q3 2022, in half a dozen regions. This move could help the company attract more users, who may otherwise find its plan prices to be a little out of their budget. Media consultancy, Ampere Analytics, estimates that the new subscription plan could help generate $8.5 billion a year for Netflix globally by the year 2027.
What do you think about ad-supported plans for streaming services?
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