Netflix Is Shuttering a Beloved, Old-School Service — And Giving Customers Something for Free The company has been mailing DVDs to customers for 25 years. But not anymore.
By Emily Rella
Opinions expressed by BIZ Experiences contributors are their own.
It's the end of an era at Netflix as the streaming giant announced that it's shuttering the service that put it on the map — renting DVDs via mail.
For the last 25 years, Netflix subscribers have had the option of renting DVDs and mailing the discs back, a model that was revolutionary when the company launched in 1998.
But now, Netflix is telling subscribers who haven't yet returned rented films to simply keep them—without any late fee or replacement charges.
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"We are not charging for any unreturned discs after 9/29," the company wrote on the X account associated with its DVD mailing plan, @DVDNetflix. "Please enjoy your final shipments for as long as you like!"
The decision to sunset the DVD service was first announced in April during an earnings report for Q1 2023.
"Our goal has always been to provide the best service for our members but as the DVD business continues to shrink that's going to become increasingly hard. So we want to go out on a high, and will be shipping our final DVDs on September 29, 2023," the company said. "DVD paved the way for streaming, ensuring that so much of what we started will continue long into the future."
Subscribers have until October 27 to return discs to the company, and the last round of DVD shipments will go out to customers on September 29.
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The company also noted that customers will receive their final bill at the end of August, and if they also have a membership plan with Netflix's streaming service, it will not be impacted.
In May, Netflix decided to crack down on password-sharing with people outside of one household, a move that angered many subscribers and critics but may have paid off big time for the company.
Last month, Netflix announced it gained almost six million new paid subscribers in Q2 of 2023.
"Most of our revenue growth this year is from growth in volume from new paid memberships and that's largely driven by our paid sharing rollout," Netflix's chief financial officer, Spencer Neumann, said in an earnings call.
Netflix was up an impressive 85.4% year-over-year as of Monday afternoon.
