Netflix on Tuesday announced that users will be able to transfer profiles when they wish to transfer them from an existing account to a new one, starting today. The move comes after the company’s recent financial woes triggered a loss of subscribers for the first time in over a decade. Netflix had also recently started charging users for accessing their accounts on devices outside of a single home address. The proposed additional fee, was reportedly perceived as an attempt to monetise the common practice of sharing passwords. The company had also announced a shift in strategy, that saw the over-the-top (OTT) streaming platform introducing an aggressive ad-based revenue generation model.
Netflix made the announcement of the ‘Profile Transfer’ feature on its blog. “Throughout life changes, your Netflix experience should stay the same,” Netflix Product Manager, Product Innovation Timi Kosztin wrote in the post. The OTT platform, however, shied away from stating that it intends to minimise password sharing on its platform through the launch of its latest feature.
The ‘Profile Transfer’ feature would allow users who are currently sharing an account to keep personalised recommendations, viewing history, My List, saved games, and other settings — when they start their own Netflix account. However, the feature does not allow for such a transfer between two existing accounts and would instead require the user wishing to break away while retaining the settings to create a new account, according to a report by XDA.
Users wishing to use the ‘Profile Transfer’ feature can head into the profile settings section, and navigate to the Transfer Profile option, and then follow the instructions.
The feature will be available to all Netflix users globally starting today, according to the company.
The OTT platform had also recently announced that it will be launching an Ads Plan subscription option for users in November for users from 12 countries including Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Spain, the UK, and the US.
The Basic with Ads plan from Netflix will cost $6.99 (roughly Rs. 570) in the US, and is scheduled to launch on November 3 in the country. Meanwhile, users in Canada and Mexico will receive the new plan on November 1. Netflix is yet to announced any new ad-supported plans for India.
