Netflix recently revealed its financial report for Q1 of 2023. After being in hot waters last year for declining subscribers, the streaming giant has reported that it has added 1.75 million net new subscribers in the first quarter of the year.
The numbers come after Netflix introduced its ad-filled option for a lower cost. The ad-supported tier launch pushed the subscriber increase. Q1 of 2023 marked the first full quarter Netflix made its ad-filled option available to subscribers. In the last quarter of 2022, Netflix gained a whopping 7.66 million subscribers. The uptick shows Netflix is on an upward trajectory, ending with a total global subscriber count of 232.5 million by Q1 2023.
Netflix has recently shifted its focus away from subscription growth and more toward revenue. While the newly added subscribers this quarter is still minor in comparison, it does account for 4.9% year-over-year growth in subscribers for the streamer. The breakdown saw paid memberships rise by 100,000 across the U.S. and Canada, 640,000 throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa and 1.5 million in the Asia-Pacific region. There was a decline in subscribers in Latin America by 450,000. These numbers directly translated to revenues with U.S. and Canada operations growing 8% versus the same period last year. In a statement, Netflix said, “We’re on track to meet our full year 2023 financial objectives. For Q2’23, we forecast revenue of $8.2B, up 3% year over year, or 6% growth on an F/X neutral basis. We’re pleased with the most recent launches of paid sharing, and while we could have launched broadly in Q1, we found opportunities to improve the experience for members. We learn more with each rollout and we’ve incorporated the latest learnings, which we think will lead to even better results. To implement these changes, we shifted out the timing of the broad launch from late Q1 to Q2. While this means that some of the expected membership growth and revenue benefit will fall in Q3 rather than Q2, we believe this will result in a better outcome for both our members and our business.”
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