Netflix password sharing: Subscribers not willing to pay additional fee to share account

After ending password sharing in over 100 countries in May, Netflix recently extended the restriction to India. As per news reports, users looking to share a Netflix subscription will not be able to avail the ‘extra member’ functionality but will have to transfer existing profiles to their own account at an additional membership cost.

According to YouGov Surveys, half of urban Indians (51 percent) are willing to pay an extra fee lesser than an actual subscription fee to share their account with family or friends. The number increases to three in five (61 percent) among people who pay for a Netflix subscription.

Password sharing has been common in India and more than half of urban Indians (55 percent) agree with the statement, “Video and music streaming services should allow password sharing among users”, with millennials showing greatest agreement (at 59 percent). In addition to this, consumers in India are also more likely to think that video and music streaming services should offer more group subscriptions – over three in five (62 percent) say so.

Currently, Netflix is the third most subscribed to platform among urban Indians, after Disney+ Hotstar (38 percent) and Amazon Prime Video (36 percent).

A deeper dive into the streaming habits of urban Indians shows that shorter-duration plans are the most preferred by urban Indians, with 36 percent saying they prefer monthly subscription plans. Having said that, three in ten prefer annual subscription plans (30 percent), but preference for quarterly plan is much lower - at 14 percent.

The data shows that seven in ten (70 percent) urban Indians are interested in trying out weekly or event specific plans, that gives them a choice to subscribe only for a particular series or sports tournament.

When it comes to paying an additional charge for renting or other premium services above the subscription cost, the largest proportion of urban Indian respondents seem comfortable (48 percent). A little over a third (35 percent) are not comfortable and 17 percent are unsure of their view.

When asked about their consumption habits, nearly six in ten (59 percent) said they have reduced their consumption of content on streaming platforms in the past six month by either reducing the number of content platforms or cancelling subscriptions. Subscription fatigue or having too many subscriptions was the biggest reason to do so, as said by 42 percent of urban Indian consumers.

Many reduced consumption to save money (38 percent), because of streaming fatigue or having too much content to watch (37- percent), while others did so because they had either already watched or were no longer watching content (25 percent).

YouGov Surveys’ data is based on adults aged 18 plus years in India with a sample size of 1011 respondents. The survey was conducted online between July 11 and 17 2023.