One-third of US Netflix subscribers share their passwords, survey results

According to new data from the Leichtman Research Group, around a third of US Netflix subscribers share their credentials with others.

The research firm’s online survey of 4,400 customers confirms the company’s findings over the past few years. While 64% of respondents said they only pay for and use Netflix at home, 33% indicate some kind of sharing. (The remaining 3% are households whose Netflix is ​​paired with other subscriptions.)

Netflix has approximately 74 million subscribers in the United States and Canada and has penetrated nearly 70% of US broadband households. With the recent decline in subscription growth in the region, Netflix recently continued to gradually raise interest rates to continue funding $ 18 billion in annual programming costs.

The streaming giant has also taken steps to stop password sharing, costing the company billions in lost revenue. However, the process is complicated as there have been no guardrails as the company has grown to become an integral part of the media landscape. There is little risk in taking actions that could be considered unduly punitive for consumers.

Earlier this month, Netflix announced a monthly trial fee for sharing passwords in three areas outside the United States. The increase in family-to-family password sharing, he explained in a blog post, “affects our ability to invest in new Big TVs and movies for us. Members.”

The password puzzle is obviously faced by all streaming players. New Netflix providers like Disney + and HBO Max have used a fairly uniform approach to sharing, as have current Amazon Prime Video and Hulu. But as programming costs rise, companies seem ever closer to closing the gap. Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said last year that the company would try different approaches, but would not release anything that seemed to “spin” subscribers.

The survey found that 29% of all services provided to direct customers are shared by others outside the household, while 12% of them are fully paid for by a person outside the household.

Younger viewers, unsurprisingly, are more likely to borrow ticket certificates. The survey found that 34% of adults between the ages of 18 and 34 have at least one streaming service that someone else pays for in full, compared to 14% of those over 35.

According to the survey, with pay TV packages provided by Hulu, YouTube and others on the Internet, about 23% of these services are also shared by many families. About 7% of them are paid in full by someone outside the family.

Password sharing is an inherent feature of most streaming services. “Sharing helps expand the customer base and build customer loyalty, but it also creates a gap between the number of families who have the service and the subscribers who actually pay,” said Bruce Leichtman, president and chief analyst at LRG.