Every year, Netflix faces increased competition from rival streaming services. Disney Plus and HBO Max already boast tens of millions of subscribers each, despite how new they are. That’s why Netflix has to spend so much money on new content. But the library isn’t all that needs updating. Every so often, the company needs to refresh the look of its apps as well. In fact, we think we may have spotted the latest Netflix redesign before it rolls out publicly. We don’t know when or if everyone will see it, but we can offer a sneak peek.
Check out the latest Netflix redesign
On Tuesday morning, our own Zach Epstein visited Netflix in his browser and discovered a fresh new look. It’s a much slicker design, and offers more details about the titles:
Meanwhile, when I visit the Netflix website in my browser, this is what I see:
This seems to suggest that Netflix is testing the change with a limited number of users. The rest of us weren’t able to see the redesign when we logged into our respective accounts. As with any significant change to the user interface, there’s truly no telling if Netflix will decide to roll this redesign out widely. It will likely depend on how users react.
That said, it seems to be an improvement over the current design. I don’t recognize all of the titles that Netflix is surfacing, so it helps to have a few descriptive keywords to give me a feel for them. As we’ve noted previously, Netflix has hundreds of secret categories that it hides from view. It appears to be using these to categorize titles in the redesign. If you want to know more about the secret categories, be sure to check out our previous coverage.
Price hikes and how to avoid them
In case you weren’t aware, Netflix increased the prices of all its plans in the US last month. The Basic plan, which lets you watch on one screen at a time in SD, increased from $8.99 to $9.99. The Standard plan, which lets users watch on two screens at a time in HD, increased from $13.99 to $15.49. Finally, the Premium plan, which lets you watch on four screens at once in 4K Ultra HD, increased from $17.99 to $19.99.
Both the Standard and Premium plans have nearly doubled in price since 2013. At this point, you might be thinking about canceling your service. Before you do that, you should consider changing to a cheaper plan. Here are the steps you’ll need to take:
- Sign in to yourNetflix account.
- UnderPlan Details, select Change Plan. (If you do not see Change Plan, pleasecontact us.)
- Choose the desired plan, then selectContinue or Update.
- SelectConfirm Change or Confirm.
If you do decide to downgrade your plan, your billing date will stay the same, and the new price will be reflected the next time that Netflix charges you. You’ll still have access to all of the features of your old plan until the next billing date.