Netflix is in such need of money after losing subscribers by the millisecond that the streaming service — which has already made moves to prevent people from sharing passwords — is introducing an ad-supported tier, which launches today (Thursday, November 3) in eight extremely unlucky countries including the United States. Deadline reports that starting 9 a.m. Pacific time, the Basic With Ads plan goes live in the U.S., United Kingdom, Australia, Japan, Brazil, France, Germany, Italy, and South Korea.
The Basic With Ads plan has already launched in Canada and Mexico (what did they do to deserve this before everyone else?) and Spain will get the ads starting November 10. Per Deadline, pricing for Basic With Ads can vary depending on location, but it is $6.99 in the U.S., while a basic plan without ads is $9.99. Netflix chief operating officer and product chief Greg Peters called Basic With Ads plan “a pro-consumer model” that will bring in “a lot more members.”
Basic With Ads will include about four to five minutes of ads per hour. Ads will be included in both television and films, but a special exception will be made for new films coming to the service, such as Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery. Out of respect for the movies (hahaha) Netflix will “just have a pre-roll” of ads before its major original film releases start so you can watch the whole thing uninterrupted. “We’ll try to preserve that sort of cinematic model there,” Peters said.
A couple of minutes of ads before a movie in the comfort of your very own home? No one has shown more respect to cinema than this!
(Per Deadline)