Netflix is reportedly trialling a multiroom service for households where flatmates/siblings/parents are always hassling account holders for their passwords.
The service currently lets you stream up to two movies or TV episodes at once from a single Netflix account.
Rather than have people in a busy house sign up for an upgraded account, Netflix will instead let subscribers bump the limit up to three for a small extra cost.
Read Recombu Digital’s guide How can I get Netflix?According to a report in the BBC, Netflix is trialling a service in the US where customers would pay $6.99/month to use one screen to watch a TV show or film. This would automatically rise to $9.99/month if three devices were using the Netflix account at once.
How account holders would go about getting that extra $3 from their flatmates/siblings/parents is of course another matter.
Currently subscribers in the US pay $7.99/month for a standard service that allows them to watch different shows or movies on two screens at once.
There is also an upgraded-account version available for $11.99/month, announced in April 2013, where customers can watch across four screens.
This new up-to-three screens subscription would be placed somewhere in the middle, for less busy homes.
Spokespeople for Netflix UK reiterated that the trial was US-based and said that it shouldn’t be taken as a sign of things to come. A spokesperson said: “There’s no new plan. This is a test. We always are testing new things.
“Not all people will see this option and it may not be something we ever offer generally.”
Netflix introduced user profiles back in August, letting various members of the family keep their recommendations separate.
Elsewhere it’s been reported by World TV PC that Netflix is trialling a cheaper SD-only service, which would be ideal for folks living in parts of the UK where they can’t quite get enough bandwidth to stream high definition titles.
As with the new multiroom service, this trial won’t be offered to everyone and shouldn’t necessarily be taken as a sign of things to come.
Netflix currently costs £5.99/month in the UK for the basic service and £8.99 if you want to stream from four devices simultaneously.
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