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Netflix’s ad-supported plan reached 70 million global monthly active users on November 12, 2024, two years after its launch. That figure represented people using the plan during a month—not 70 million paid subscriptions or households. The milestone showed that Netflix had turned a lower-priced tier into both a major customer-acquisition channel and the foundation of a global advertising business.
The growth in four milestones
| Date | Reported audience | Significance |
|---|---|---|
| May 2023 | 5 million global monthly active users | Early adoption roughly six months after launch |
| November 2023 | 15 million | Threefold growth in the first year |
| May 2024 | 40 million | Rapid acceleration; more than 40% of new sign-ups in advertising markets chose the plan |
| November 2024 | 70 million | More than 50% of new sign-ups in advertising markets chose the plan |
Netflix reported these figures in announcements about its advertising business, including its first-year update, the 2024 Upfront, and the plan’s second anniversary.
The percentages applied only to countries where the ads plan was available and referred to new sign-ups, not to all Netflix customers worldwide. They nevertheless showed that the tier was becoming a mainstream entry point rather than a niche downgrade option.
Why Netflix introduced advertising
Netflix announced a lower-priced advertising tier in 2022 after subscriber growth slowed and investors placed greater pressure on the company to find additional ways to monetize its audience. The plan had two objectives: offer a cheaper way into Netflix for price-sensitive consumers and create a new advertising business alongside subscriptions.
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This was not simply a rescue plan. Netflix was deliberately entering a large adjacent market while preserving its subscription model. In July 2022, it selected Microsoft as its global advertising technology and sales partner. Netflix described the ads tier as complementary to its ad-free plans rather than an immediate replacement for them. The original partnership was announced by Netflix and Microsoft.
What launched in November 2022
The service first became available in 12 countries: Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Mexico, South Korea, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
In the United States, the historical launch price was $6.99 per month. That was the November 2022 launch price, not a current U.S. price for 2026.
- Video quality was initially up to 720p/HD.
- Netflix estimated approximately four to five minutes of advertising per hour.
- Ads appeared before and during programs.
- Launch creative included 15- and 30-second formats.
- Advertisers received broad country and genre targeting, alongside brand-safety controls.
- Some titles were unavailable because of licensing restrictions.
- Downloads were not available at launch.
The launch details are documented in Netflix’s announcements for the United States, Australia, and Canada.
Why adoption accelerated
A lower price widened the market
The central consumer proposition was simple: tolerate commercial interruptions in exchange for a lower monthly bill. That appealed to people who had never subscribed as well as existing customers willing to trade some convenience for savings.
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However, the public 70 million figure does not reveal how many users were new customers and how many migrated from ad-free tiers. The growth therefore reflects a mixture of incremental acquisition and plan switching.
Netflix launched at global scale
Netflix did not restrict the experiment to a single country. Its 12-market launch included the United States, United Kingdom, Canada, major European markets, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Brazil, and Australia. That immediately created a large potential audience for international advertisers and allowed Netflix to develop campaigns across several regions at once.
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Netflix did not need to build a separate free service or an entirely separate content library. The ads tier was attached to the company’s established entertainment ecosystem, subject to licensing differences. Films, scripted series, reality programming, and eventually live programming gave viewers reasons to accept advertising.
This distinction is important: content and the subscription product acquired the user; advertising technology monetized the attention. The 70 million milestone was not primarily the result of a new ad format.
Netflix removed early disadvantages
The launch product had meaningful limitations, but Netflix improved it during the first year:
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- Breathtaking picture quality: Stunningly sharp 4K picture brings out rich detail in your entertainment with four times the resolution of HD. Watch as colors pop off your screen and enjoy lifelike clarity with Dolby Vision and HDR10+.
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- Resolution increased from 720p to 1080p.
- Two simultaneous streams became available.
- Downloads were added.
- Ad formats and targeting options expanded.
- Measurement and verification capabilities improved.
Those changes made the lower-priced plan easier to accept, especially for households comparing it with ad-free tiers. Netflix’s product and advertising updates are summarized in its one-year report.
How Netflix built the advertising business
Audience growth and advertiser confidence had to develop together. Advertisers needed reliable measurement, brand-safety controls, viewability and invalid-traffic verification, targeting, programmatic buying, and sponsorship opportunities.
At launch, Netflix worked with Microsoft and announced relationships with measurement and verification companies including DoubleVerify, Integral Ad Science, and Nielsen. It also developed partnerships involving firms such as EDO and Kantar.
By November 2024, Netflix said Canada was operating entirely on its own advertising technology and that its in-house platform would roll out globally during 2025. It also described programmatic-guaranteed buying in the United States, Brazil, Canada, and Mexico.
The change was strategically significant. Building its own advertising technology gave Netflix greater control over forecasting, targeting, reporting, campaign execution, and commercial relationships, even while it continued working with external buying and measurement partners. Netflix later said its Ads Suite had been implemented across all 12 ad-supported countries and was serving thousands of advertising clients worldwide. See Netflix’s two-year update and its later Ads Suite update.
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Why the metric matters
Monthly active users were useful to advertisers because they described people actually using the ad-supported service during a month, rather than merely the number of billing accounts. But the figure has limits:
- A monthly active user is not necessarily a unique paid subscriber.
- One household subscription can represent several viewers.
- The measure does not show how many accounts paid for the plan.
- It does not reveal advertising revenue, fill rate, pricing, or profit.
For that reason, “Netflix had 70 million ad-tier subscribers” is incorrect. The accurate description is that Netflix reported 70 million global monthly active users of the ad-supported plan.
What happened to the advertising audience afterward?
Netflix later reported more than 94 million global monthly active users in May 2025. In November 2025 it reported more than 190 million global monthly active viewers, and in May 2026 it reported more than 250 million global monthly active viewers.
These figures provide useful evidence of expanding advertising reach, but they should not be displayed as a perfectly continuous extension of the 70 million series. Netflix shifted from “monthly active users” to the broader-sounding “monthly active viewers,” and the later metric incorporates estimated household viewing. The relevant announcements are Netflix’s 2025 Upfront, 2025 advertising update, and 2026 Upfront.
The economics behind the strategy
The ads tier creates two possible revenue streams from the same viewing relationship:
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- Subscription revenue: the customer pays a lower monthly fee.
- Advertising revenue: brands pay to reach that customer and other household viewers.
The strategy can be attractive if advertising revenue offsets the lower subscription price and if the cheaper tier brings in customers who would otherwise not subscribe. It can be less attractive when existing ad-free subscribers downgrade, because Netflix may exchange a higher subscription fee for a lower one and then depend on uncertain advertising yield.
The 70 million milestone alone cannot determine which effect dominated. It also cannot prove that the ads business was already mature or profitable. Netflix said in its second-quarter 2024 shareholder letter that advertising was not expected to be the company’s primary near-term revenue-growth driver, even as Netflix built toward greater long-term scale.
What the milestone really demonstrated
Netflix’s achievement was more than a simple hockey-stick chart. The company combined a lower price, a broad international launch, a powerful content library, improving product features, and an increasingly sophisticated advertising operation.
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The 70 million figure demonstrated that advertising could coexist with Netflix’s premium streaming identity. It also showed that a cheaper tier could serve as both an acquisition funnel and the audience base for a global advertising platform. But the milestone must be read correctly: it measured substantial monthly reach and engagement, not 70 million paying households, guaranteed advertising revenue, or proof that every user was newly acquired.
For advertisers and media planners, the important question is no longer simply how many people Netflix can reach. It is how Netflix defines that reach, where inventory is available, which buying platforms can access it, and how campaign results are measured.
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