Netflix after two months – what do you think?
Netflix launched more than two months ago to much fanfare and anticipation. Since then, it and rival service LoveFilm have been locked in a very public duel. We compared Netflix vs LoveFilm back in January, but now more time has passed what do people think? Two months on, Which? staff and readers share their views.
Netflix after two months – Jack’s first impressions
As a user of Netflix for the past few months, I feel that the service delivers in some areas, and fails in others. For a video-on-demand service such as this, content is king. Currently, Netflix is a let-down in terms of the breadth and quality of the films and TV shows it offers, especially when compared with the service in the US. However, that’s not to say its rival, LoveFilm, does much better. While LoveFilm has a larger library, I can’t say there’s more I’d like to actually watch.
So, the library needs work, and I hope that we’ll see a lot more TV shows and films in the near future.
One area where Netflix has triumphed is in its cross-platform compatibility. Watching a TV show on my laptop, and then picking up where I left off on my mobile phone, is a great feature.
Then there’s the high definition content, especially important if you’re watching a film on a large screen. Again, Netflix has the advantage over Lovefilm here.
Netflix after two months – Andy’s first impressions
During my free trial I used Netflix on my Xbox 360 games console. The app is excellent – it’s easy to navigate and does a good job of highlighting films and TV shows I might be interested in. It’s much better in this respect than LoveFilm’s Xbox app. In fact, the app as a whole is more polished – I loved the way, when watching TV shows, I could skip to the next episode right from the end of the last.
The range of TV programmes in general seemed better, and the support for HD and 5.1 surround sound meant the quality was better more often than not. There are some good films available as well, but not quite enough to persuade me to continue. Once this improves I’m sure I’ll return for another try.
Netflix after two months – what you’re saying
Chris C isn’t a fan, saying:
Netflix is poor, end of discussion. Their movie catalogue is atrocious! I found myself watching a few of the TV series and really nothing more. One day I’m sure it will rival any other company and have a fantastic selection. But it won’t be this year, and I doubt it will be next year either
David disagrees:
I have used Netflix for a month and although it don’t have the latest films, it does have a number which I had not seen at the movies when they first came out and are worth a watch!
Even SKY who charge £10 per month plus the HD subscription don’t have films that are that new!
SkillJim is another satisfied customer:
Me and my girlfriend have watched a bucket load of films already that we always wanted to watch but never got around to seeing, most recent being Buried :). All look great on your HD TV, and you would not know that you aren’t watching a DVD, the quality is very impressive for a streaming service.
The TV shows library is also great. There’s like 6 full seasons of 24, all the inbetweeners seasons, 5 seasons of the office, breaking bad, just loads of shows like that for people to be introduced to. I think it’s fantastic. On demand movies and TV is where it’s at right now, and for 6 quid a month, it’s a steal to sub to netflix
boomhaueruk isn’t sure about the digital-only aspect:
For myself, I have a great internet connection, but am sticking with Lovefilm for now – a service that relies solely on 100% of an internet connection seems a little limited to me. Can I pop the internet connection into the car when my kids want to watch a dvd on a trip in the car? No I can’t.
And if, say, 3 of us are using the service at the same time for different things, do we all have to have internet connected devices? Yes. And yet, we can all watch dvds quite happily in different rooms.
am I giving my 3 year old an Ipad? No. So you see it’s all down to what you need to do.
As you can see, Netflix has its fans and critics. Have you tried Netflix? Let us know what you think in the comments below.
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dave
I was looking forward to trying Netflix only to find that it is, and will remain, incompatible with my 3 month old Sony internet TV – how about that for instant obsolescence.
Jack Turner
A very frustrating situation, Dave.
Sony are saying that it cannot apply the Netflix service to older models, and are taking quite a bit of heat for it on their forums.
As TVs become more complex and offer more services, I fear that this might be something we see more of in the future. It’s certainly an issue we’ll keep an eye on.
Macca
I joined Netflix around a fortnight ago and quite frankly i am very disappointed with the choice of films and TV shows. I doubt I will be staying for another month. Probably best to wait until they have a more varied range of newer films…
jonathan
I have a Netflix account which I’m very happy with. It works across my pc, mac, ipad and apple tv perfectly. The interface with Apple TV is excellent and has a look and feel exactly like iTunes. OK the film selection is small, but it’s growing, even in the past two months since I’ve joined I’ve seen an improvement in their database. For 5.99 per month I think it’s hard to beat.
david
i have started my one month free trial with netflix im three weeks in and i have seen everything worth watching without them updating the content i wont be continuing my subscription which is a shame because the sevice and softwear is great will be returning later in the year or early next when the content is updated
Lego
I subscribed for the free one month trial but as soon as I saw how little there was I wanted to watch I stopped there. Is it because the free trial doesn’t allow you to see the whole library in case people download loads of stuff and then leave after one month is up?
Jack Turner
Hi Lego.
When you sign up for a free trial with Netflix, you have access to their entire catalogue. You’re not the first to be unimpressed with their content!
Hopefully as time goes on we’ll see more TV shows and films being added on a regular basis to build up the selection. I’d love to see the UK store reach the heights of the USA Netflix site, which currently offers a lot more content than we get.
Peter Stirner
I joined Netflix almost three months ago. My first reaction was “I’m glad this is a FREE trial because I’d never want to pay for this!” The problem is that the selection is so limited. If you like films then you’ve probably already seen most of the films on offer. Within a couple of days I was spending time desperately trying to find something to watch. A lot of the films on offer are ones scoring less than 6 on IMDB.
In the end I didn’t give up the trial after the first month because my wife wanted to watch Twin Peaks again. And to be fair I did discover a couple of good TV series, Marchlands and The Jury. But, unless I fancy rewatching 24 or a load of old telly movies, there really isn’t enough on there to make keeping my subscription worthwhile.
Peter Stirner
An update: I signed up for the LoveFilm free trial. I have just cancelled. The problem is the same, not enough titles to make it worthwhile. The TV shows are basically, Lost, Prison Break, Desperate Housewives, Lie to Me, and the movies are mostly old titles Turner and Hooch, Beaches, Sea Biscuit, etc.
It’s harder/more annoying to use than Netflix. One annoying feature is that they will display each episode of a TV show as a seperate entry in the search results. A second problem is that they categorize movies in an odd way. Thriller, for example, to them means Serial killers whereas Drama means pretty much everything in the catalogue. Finally, when you do a search for a particular movie they will show the pages for the DVDs they send out rather than the Instant streaming page. Not much use if, like me, you only signed up for the instant streaming option.
Cancelling is easy but they try hard to keep you. If you have a few days left of your free trial then they will try to tempt you into watching some movies – this will cancel your cancelling if you decide to watch one more movie. Stick to your guns and cancel and this will end the free trial regardless of how many days you have left.
It’s worth signing up for free and seeing if you like it, I imagine lots of people do like it, but it wasn’t for me.