Cheaper Netflix may be coming, but it will come with a lot of caveats, it seems.
According to a new report by Bloomberg, the streaming platform’s upcoming ad-supported streaming plan won’t allow downloading shows and movies for offline viewing.
The news comes from a line of text in Netflix’s app unearthed by developer Steve Moser, which literally says, “Downloads available on all plans except Netflix with ads.”
While this is a strong indication that ad-supported plans won’t support downloads, Netflix could change this before launch, and the product may have different features depending on the market. Bloomberg says that Netflix’s ad-supported plan is still several months away.
Netflix started talking about introducing an ad-supported streaming plan in April, initially indicating that it’s coming “over the next year or two.” The company seemingly accelerated the rollout, because Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos said in June that the ad-supported plan will start rolling out by the end of the year.
But as if ads weren’t bad enough, it appears that this new streaming plan will be limited in other ways. In July, Sarandos confirmed that the ad-supported plan will not have all of Netflix’s licensed content, though he did say that “the vast majority of what people watch on Netflix” will be available.
Netflix lost subscribers in the first two quarters of 2022, prompting the company to revisit its business strategy. Besides the announcement of the new, ad-supported plan, this has so far amounted to higher prices and clamping down on account sharing.