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Since initiating the crackdown on password sharing on May 23, Netflix saw the highest number of daily sign-ups in the following four days, market data platform Antenna revealed in its recent blog post. According to the report, Netflix welcomed almost 100,000 new users on both May 26 and May 27.

Netflix Shares Advance 3% in Pre-market

Shares of Netflix climbed 3% in pre-market trading on Friday after new data by streaming analytics firm Antenna showed a fresh uptick in the company’s subscriber numbers, driven by its recently commenced crackdown on password sharing in the US. The streaming giant witnessed “the four single largest days of U.S. user acquisition in the four and a half years that Antenna has been measuring the streaming service,” Antenna wrote in its blog post.

More specifically, on both May 26 and May 27, Netflix saw almost 100,000 new daily sign-ups. During this period, average daily new account registrations on Netflix hit 73,000, marking a 102% jump from the earlier 60-day average.

“These exceed the spikes in Sign-ups Antenna observed during the initial U.S. Covid-19 lockdowns in March and April 2020. Cancels also increased during this period, but not as much as Sign-ups. The ratio of Sign-ups to Cancels since May 23rd is up +25.6% compared to the previous 60-day period,” the report stated.

Password Crackdown Yields Results

Data shared by Antenna clearly shows that Netflix’s plan to terminate password sharing – a decision that attracted significant backlash from its subscribers – is coming to fruition. According to Netflix’s previous comments on this matter, over 100 million of its people in the world watch Netflix content using someone else’s account.

The move represents an important victory for Netflix, which struggled with declining subscriber numbers last year amid intensifying competition from Disney+, Hulu, HBOMax, and AppleTV+.

By clamping down on password sharing, Netflix now forces users who share an account outside the same household to pay an additional $7.99 per month if they wish to continue watching content on the platform. In addition, there is a limited number of extra members that owners can add to their accounts, depending on which subscription plan they are using.

Late last year, Netflix also rolled out a fresh ad-supported tier to attract users who do not want to subscribe to the more expensive plans. However, the move did not receive a strong response at launch, as Antenna’s data showed it was the least popular plan in November 2022.

Do you think this trend of growing subscriber numbers will continue when Netflix commences the password-sharing crackdown in other markets?

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