After months of claims and taunts, it seems like Netflix is finally fulfilling its unpopular promise to incorporate advertisements into the service. Because, after all, when you’re watching a disturbing scene of Jeffrey Dahmer heinously murdering people, throwing in a quick ad break for hand soap is exactly what the people want.
Netflix has been preparing subscribers for the opportunity to pay for a cheaper plan since earlier this year. The new ad tier will launch the first week of November, so at least your Halloween watching will remain ad-free. At $6.99, this will be the cheapest subscription for Netflix, and service for existing subscribers won’t be affected, unless those existing subscribers are interested in adding an extra 5 minutes of advertisements for Wonder bread in between episodes of The Great British Baking Show.
In addition to the ads, the video quality will be reduced to 720p as opposed to its Standard-tier 1080p. Netflix also confirmed that a limited number of movies and TV shows won’t be available due to local licensing restrictions, but they are working on it. The one good thing about Netflix’s pivot to ads is that they will not be running any political or policy ads, which is NOT the case for some others. They will also limit the number of breaks during longer films in order to preserve the “cinematic experience.” That’s fair, but could you imagine how long The Irishman would be with all those ads for Domino’s pizza?
The streamer also announced that beginning in 2023, Nielsen will be measuring Netflix’s viewership and ad data in order to collect and verify just how many people are actually watching Stranger Things. And more of their shows, of course, but that’s the one they really care about.
The official launch date for ad-supported accounts will be November 3rd and will be available in The U.S., Canada, U.K., Australia, Brazil, Spain, Mexico, Korea, Japan, France, Germany, and Italy.