Netflix has recently come under fire for raising their prices and ditching shows which has left many subscribers wondering if their monthly fee is worth it - and I have to admit, I’m one of them.
My household holds subscriptions with Disney Plus, Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, but some are currently looking more appealing than others. For example, Amazon Prime subscribers shunned the streaming service last week as Grey’s Anatomy moved over to Disney Plus, as well as New Girl and a number of Marvel series heading over from Netflix.
And we’ve really been making good use of our Disney subscription over the past few months, having started watching the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies in chronological order.
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So it’s really left me wondering if paying out for all of these subscription services is worth it? So I took a look at my family’s Netflix usage to find out.
Netflix recently announced it will be increasing its subscription prices by 17 per cent, meaning my £9.99 standard subscription has gone up to £10.99 a month. We opted for this package over the now £6.99 a month basic option so that we could utilise the two-screen feature, in case I want to watch something separately to my parents from a different room.
According to Ofcom , the average adult spends an hour and five minutes watching TV, films and series on streaming services, which would work out at 34p an hour, dividing the £10.99 fee over 30 to 31 days.
So, with more than 5,000 movies and 2,000 TV shows to choose from, I worked out whether my family and I are spending our money wisely with the streaming service, or, if our £11 a month would be better spent elsewhere.
On Netflix, you can search your viewing history all the way back to the very first things you’ve watched. This feature is how I realised someone had hacked my Netflix account and had been streaming shows and series all the way from Vietnam.
I looked at my own viewing history, as well as my mum's and dad's to find our how many hours of TV we’ve watched both separately and together since the start of 2022, and was stunned to discover it’s less than average.
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Here’s what I found:
My mum has spent much of 2022 streaming Married at First Sight Australia via Sky, and so her Netflix viewing time was considerably lower than the rest of the family. She had however, enjoyed a couple of episodes of Friends - though I’m not sure why as it’s re-running on Comedy Central pretty much 24/7.
She also watched the pilot episodes of Pretty Little Liars and Brooklyn Nine-Nine, though clearly realised they weren’t for her and failed to watch any further episodes.
But when season two of Cheer was released, my mum did indulge in a nine-episode binge, each episode being around 50 minutes long.
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It was my viewing habits that came in second place, having only watched two things myself since the start of the year. The rest of my viewing activity was from my account hacker, who seemed to enjoy the Twilight saga and lots of Teen Wolf.
Personally, I’ve only watched Red Notice starring Ryan Reynolds and Dwayne Johnson - a must-see comedy, in my opinion. And I’ve finally got around to watching Schitt’s Creek, so since March I’ve watched 53 20 minute episodes, with a season and a half to go.
My dad’s viewing history was the longest, but this is down to the fact that when we watch things as a family, we typically watch them on his profile - though he does watch some things on his own too.
Since January, my dad’s viewing history sees three episodes of Maid and 10 episodes of Cobra Kai season four, as well as two episodes of Stay Close and the entire third season of Ricky Gervais’ Afterlife. It also features two episodes of The Witcher, one episode of The Good Cop, followed by an episode of Archive 81.
In terms of films, we’ve enjoyed The Gentlemen, Spenser Confidential starring Mark Wahlberg, 13 Minutes and Night Hunter, as well as I See You, 14 Peaks and The Adam Project - because we love Ryan Reynolds.
My parents have watched eight 50 minute episodes of vikings: Valhalla and ten episodes of The Last Kingdom, and The Last Witch Hunter movie, alongside the docu-series Hitler’s Secret Sex Life, Chris Rock: Tambourine, Boiling Point and Ricky Gervais in Special Correspondence.
They’ve also watched 47 minutes of the first season of Frontier - though clearly wasn’t a hit with them - and in line with watching all of the Marvel movies, Spider-man: Homecoming.
Totting up a rough idea of the number of minutes we’d spent watching Netflix since the start of the year, I reached 5,073 minutes as my final figure, which is around 84 and a half hours.
That means in 114 days, we’ve watched less than the average hour and five minutes a day, and actually only watched 44 and a half minutes a day.
This would suggest we aren’t quite getting the most out of our subscription, as Netflix is costing us around 52p an hour to watch.
With that in mind, now could be the time to re-evaluate the subscriptions you use and see where you could save. While we’re unlikely to cancel our Netflix account, I’m considering reducing our package to save a couple of quid a month, after all, it’s the only place I can watch Bridgerton.
However, I do find Disney Plus to be the superior steaming option at the moment, with the addition of The Kardashians, Grey's Anatomy and the new Marvel series.
