By Kayla Cahill, Staff Writer

June 16, 2022

Over the years Netflix has been one of the top streaming service providers around the world so the recent drop in subscribers has had people asking; what happened? 

Netflix’s subscriber count fell by “200,000 subscribers during the January-March period” according to cbsnews.com. They also plan to lose even more subscribers throughout the rest of the year. 

If you ask me, the recent drop in subscribers is due to the fact that Netflix keeps trying to raise prices but is taking off people's beloved shows and then blaming it on password sharing. Although I do agree that password sharing is a real thing and could be an issue for them, it’s not the main issue that they are having and they are hyper-fixating on it. 

Any time Netflix does a press release on finances or investments they hyperfocus on password sharing and I think it's time that they take a step back and realize their other issues. 

The raises in price have definitely been one of their main issues. According to theverge.com “The service’s basic plan now costs $9.99 per month (up from $8.99), its standard tier costs $15.49 per month (up from $13.99), and its 4K tier costs $19.99 per month (up from $17.99)”. Now, why would anyone pay for that when they could just pay for platforms like Hulu which cost $3 less per month and have more shows that people actually want to watch. 

Taking off shows like "Gossip Girl" and "Criminal Minds" isn’t helping their case either. Now I understand that things like licenses and copyright play a part in these shows being taken off but what about shows like The Society? The Society was a Netflix-released show that fans loved. The show even got announced for a second season but was canceled due to “Covid” even though so many other shows continued production. Doing things like this is the reason they are losing subscribers. 

The low additions are also a problem. Although Netflix may be adding shows at the same rate that they used to be, the shows are not anything that anyone wants to watch. I think the only thing I have been excited to watch on Netflix was Stranger Things and nobody wants to watch a show about the Hype House. 

Overall, Netflix needs to take some very real criticism if they want to continue to be a top streaming platform. So my advice for Netflix, listen to your customers. The problem is you, not the people.