Netflix Adds HDR10 Plus Format for Subscribers With Premium Accounts

Netflix is now streaming a few of its video content material within the HDR10 plus format, an improve to HDR10 that it was additionally supporting alongside Dolby Imaginative and prescient.

The excessive dynamic vary format is offered to Premium subscribers of the video service and the corporate says that for individuals who have units that help the format, “The dynamic metadata included in our HDR10 plus content material improves the standard and accuracy of the image when seen on these units.”

Netflix says that it has been producing content material within the three main HDR codecs because it debuted its collection Marco Polo in 2014 and the corporate has about 11,000 hours of HDR materials in its catalog. 

The announcement is perhaps excellent news for homeowners of Samsung TV units — the corporate has supported the format and has included it with lots of its 4K units. Invoice Mandel, vice chairman at Samsung Analysis America, posted on LinkedIn, “Nicely Netflix has began utilizing HDR10 plus… Particular to this announcement is use of the newest excessive effectivity codec (AV1) facilitating the very best high quality and lowest bandwidth.”

Will viewers discover the distinction?

Dan Rayburn, a marketing consultant and chairman of the NAB Streaming Summit, mentioned the addition is in step with Netflix’s providing for customers prepared to pay $25 a month. 

“Netflix is all about delivering the very best quality video, and HDR10+ permits them to do this,” Rayburn mentioned.

Whether or not viewers will have the ability to discover the sort of variations Netflix touts in its weblog continues to be unclear. 

“Some will not see the distinction in high quality, similar to some cannot inform the distinction between HD and 4K, relying on the system, whereas others can,” Rayburn mentioned. “So it is private desire on what shoppers wish to spend every month and the extent of high quality that’s most essential to them, based mostly on their viewing habits and the system they’re viewing it on.”

Different streaming companies that supply HDR10+ embrace Disney Plus, AppleTV Plus and Amazon Prime Video.

In January, Netflix introduced value hikes throughout all its plans and added an possibility so as to add additional customers. The Premium plan, which permits for HDR10+ streaming, went up $2 to $25.