Netflix lost almost a million subscribers in three months – plans to launch a cheaper subscription option with ads

The streaming service Netflix lost a total of 970,000 subscribers during the second quarter, the company says in a letter to its shareholders.

Netflix now has just under 221 million subscribers. However, the losses in the second quarter were smaller than the company expected, the company says in the letter.

According to the letter, changes are also planned for the service itself.

The management of Netflix has made it clear, according to the news agency AFP, that the company intends to become stricter in the sharing of passwords and login information. Sharing them has made it possible for many to consume the contents of the streaming service for free.

In order to get new subscribers, for example, Netflix plans to launch a new subscription model that costs less than before, but which includes advertisements. The service is planned in cooperation with Microsoft.

Netflix lost 200,000 subscribers in the first quarter of the year compared to the end of 2021. The result was quite a shock, and the poor performance pushed the company’s price down more than 25 percent in the secondary market. Before the beginning of the year, the company’s subscriber numbers had not decreased for ten years.

However, the losses have been explained by the termination of the company’s business in Russia. In March, Netflix announced that it was withdrawing from the Russian market. In April, the company told its investors that it had lost 700,000 paying subscribers due to the withdrawal from Russia.

In its forecast for the current quarter, Netflix estimated that it would have an increase of one million subscribers.

In addition, the company announced that it had increased its turnover by nine percent, despite the decrease in the number of subscribers. Last year, Netflix’s turnover totaled more than 30 billion dollars. The company made six billion dollars in profit.

Netflix’s price went up ten percent on Tuesday.