Netflix, primary home and travel: Q&A about limiting account sharing

What we feared in recent months has arrived, and it has done so almost without giving us time to react. On February 8, Netflix announced it has started implementing its system to limit the use of accounts outside the home of the subscription administrator and Spain was one of the countries chosen as a “guinea pig”. In the next few days we will receive the dreaded email reminding us of this “Netflix is ​​for a family” because it’s far away “Love is sharing a password (Love is sharing a password)” that the platform account tweeted in 2017. The reason, again, is that more than 100 million households share accounts and that, in the words of the company, “reduces their ability to invest in creating great stories, told with the highest quality series and films”.

Since the arrival of these restrictions has been a bit (very) abrupt, we will try to answer all your questions so that the transition is as comfortable as possible. We reached out to Netflix, who elaborated a bit more on some details that the help website doesn’t fully clarify. But, let’s start at the beginning:

– What happened?

As of February 9, Netflix does not allow users who do not live in the same household as the administrator to continue using that account. As you will recall in the email sent to the administrators of each account: “Netflix is ​​meant to share it with people who live in the same house”.

– How do you create a primary home?

Administrators need to configure which is the “main home” by accessing Netflix through a TV connected to the home network, WiFi or cable. An alert will pop up to set up the primary home, or they can do it from the left menu, by going to Get Help > Manage Primary Location. You just have to follow the steps that appear on the screen. If you’re not watching Netflix through a TV, Netflix says you don’t need to set up a primary home because they’ll use your IP address, device identifiers, and account activity to track locations. Warning, yes, with homes with multiple WiFi networks. Netflix recommends setting your primary home to the network you use the most because it may treat secondary networks as different from your primary home.

– What if I don’t configure it?

Netflix itself will automatically locate your “main home” based on your IP address, device identifiers, and account activity. The primary residence can be changed manually at any time.

– Until what day do I have to set it up?

Until February 21st. From that day, Netflix will automatically set the primary home. The platform is sending an email to the administrators of each account to notify them, if you haven’t received it yet it should reach you in the next few days.

– How will Netflix control who lives in the main house and who doesn’t?

Using, again, IP address, device identifiers and account activity, which is the data we agree to share with Netflix when we agree to terms and conditions that nobody reads. Never via GPS. For a device to be understood as being used by a person who lives in the main residence, it will need to connect to the home network at least once a month.

Netflix on the go

– And the trip?

This is where “connect to your primary home network at least once a month” comes into play. To be able to use a device when we travel, we will need to connect it to the main home network before leaving. From that moment we can use it wherever we want, as we have done until now. As long as we have connected it to the main home network first, it doesn’t matter if we then connect it to the WiFi of the hotel or our holiday accommodation, or use it with data to view content on public transport.

Netflix’s help website also claims that we can access TVs in hotels or vacation rentals, but we haven’t yet had an answer as to how they will differentiate that access or what would happen if, while traveling, we acquired a new device that was never connected to your primary home network.

– If my trip lasts more than a month, what happens?

In cases where you spend more than a month away from your primary home (for example, college students who share an account with their roommates, with whom they live most of the year, and return to their parents’ home to spend the whole summer), unfortunately Netflix considers that scenario “two different families”, so they will no longer be able to use that device to view that Netflix account.

– What will happen to users who do not live in the same home as the administrator?

They will no longer be able to use that Netflix account (unless they feel like taking all their TVs and devices to the admin home to “activate” them once a month and the platform probably has systems in place to handle these tricks ). For those who had a profile in an account of someone they don’t live with, Netflix offers them the possibility to create their own account on the platform and transfer the profile they had in the old account to the new account, keeping the viewing history, the section ” My List”, saved games and recommendations.

– Isn’t there an intermediate option?

The Standard and Premium plans have the option to purchase “extra subscribers”. This is a “sub-account” with your own username and password for access, but paid for by the main account administrator. That extra subscriber works like another home, so you can use any device to watch Netflix at home and use them after your trip. Naturally, it comes with a number of restrictions: that sub-account can only have one profile (it can be transferred from the main account), can only play content on one device, and can only download content for offline viewing on one device.

The Standard plan (€12.99 per month) allows you to purchase just one more subscriber, while the Premium plan (€17.99 per month) allows you to add two more subscribers. Each additional subscriber costs 5.99 euros per month.

– What are the Netflix price plans like now?

Subscription prices do not change:

The Basic plan with advertising costs 5.49 euros per month. Content can only be viewed on one device at a time and cannot be downloaded. It doesn’t have the full Netflix catalog. The content plays only in 720p quality.

The Basic plan without ads costs 7.99 euros per month. Content can only be viewed on one device at a time, and content can be downloaded to one device. It has the entire catalog, but it only runs at 720p quality.

The Standard plan costs 12.99 euros per month. It allows you to play content on two devices simultaneously and download content to two devices. Playback quality is 1080p (Full HD). It allows one more subscriber for an extra 5.99 euros per month, for a total of 18.98 euros per month.

The Premium plan costs 17.99 euros per month. It lets you play content on four devices simultaneously and download it to six devices. Content is played in 4K quality and now also includes spatial audio. It allows up to two extra subscribers for €5.99 per month each. With the two additional subscribers, the total price would be 29.97 euros per month.

– I’m not convinced, how do I cancel my Netflix account?

From the “Account” section within Netflix you can cancel your subscription.

– What alternatives do I have?

It will be on streaming platforms! Last November we reviewed the prices that the main platforms in our country had at that time. As several Twitter users have pointed out, the Netflix Premium plan costs 216 euros per year (not counting the extra subscribers). The annual offers of HBO Max, Amazon Prime Video and Disney + together cost 210 euros. But let’s not trust ourselves, as Netflix does well in the long run, they will all follow the same path.