• Basic with Adverts from Netflix will feed subscribers 4 – 5 minutes of advertising per hour.
• Adverts will be 15 or 30 seconds long.
• The subscription tier will only be available in 12 countries at launch.

There has been much talk about Netflix launching an advertising supported tier to draw in more viewers and now that solution is officially available as Basic with Adverts.

Technically, the newtier is only available in 12 countries namely Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Spain, the UK, and the US. The subscription tier will also only be available from 3rd November.

“Basic with Adverts will launch just six months after we first announced the option of a lower priced adverts plan. None of this would have been possible without our team’s hard work or Microsoft’s extraordinary partnership,” said chief operating and product officer at Netflix, Greg Peters.

The pricing for this tier varies from region to region. In the UK the Basic with Adverts tier costs £4.99, in Canada $5.99 and in the US, $6.99.

So how many adverts is Netflix going to throw at viewers? According to a press release, four to five minutes of adverts per hour. Adverts will be 15 or 30 seconds in length.

For advertisers, Netflix will provide a range of broad targeting controls as well as ways to restrict advertising on content that may not be consistent with their brand. As for verification tools, Netflix is working with DoubleVerify and Integral Ad Science to verify the viewability and traffic validity of its adverts. This verification will being in the first quarter of 2023.

For viewers expecting the full Netflix catalogue for a song, think again. The platform said, “a limited number of movies and TV shows won’t be available due to licensing restrictions”. The streaming resolution is also limited to 720p.

Downloading for offline viewing also won’t be available.

There is no word on a local launch of this tier, but we’d argued that South Africa doesn’t exactly need this tier. Netflix offers a mobile only subscription tier for R49 per month and at our conversions, the Netflix Basic with Adverts tier would cost ~R127 which is more than Basic but less than Standard.

If Netflix were to launch this subscription tier here it would need to be R49 or cheaper to be attractive.

Whether this subscription tier will be enough to stop the exodus of subscribers and bring new folks on board is unclear but Netflix has to do something in the face of increased and aggressive competition.

Should Netflix give us any information regarding local availability of Basic with Adverts we will be sure to update you.