Netflix Reportedly Loses Over 200k Subscribers In Q1 2022

Netflix’s customer base is reported to have seen a recent, staggering loss of >200,000 subscribers. The first time that Netflix’s subscribers have fallen since the streaming service became available throughout most of the world outside of China six years ago.

Speculations making the round in the business world is that the pioneer streaming service might not be so novel anymore and have seen the last of its better days.

Part of the subscribers loss is blamed on Netflix’s decision to pull out of Russia following the country’s invasion of Ukraine, a move that saw it lose ~700,000 subscribers.

Acknowledging that the worst may be yet to come, Netflix envisages another round of loss to the tune of two million subscribers between the April – June quarter of the year. Password sharing, a problematic trend among users that’s proven difficult to curb, is partly to blame for this projection. Netflix revealed that over 100 million households are using the service through a password shared with them. That’s a really large number.

“We realized with all of the account sharing, which we’ve always had — that’s not a new thing — but when you add that up together, we’re getting pretty high market penetration and that, combined with the competition, is really what we think is driving the lower acquisition and lower growth,” Netflix co-CEO Reed Hastings revealed, in Netflix’s earnings interview as reported by Business Insider.

Recall that Netflix is currently testing a new feature to charge customers who want to share their password extra.

Do you think Netflix’s best days are behind them, or that they’ll surmount this current hurdle? Let me know in the comments.