Netflix throttling HD video quality in Europe annoys some users – variety

About two months ago, Netflix said it would reduce the 30-day video bit rate in Europe, with the goal of reducing the bandwidth consumers spend on bandwidth by 25% during the COVID-19 crisis.

It’s been 55 days since the announcement – and Netflix subscribers in Europe and the United States say streamers are still delivering Throtled HD and Ultra HD video, in some cases a bit rate of less than 50%. They said that especially in large TV screen sizes there has been a noticeable deterioration in image quality with blurring and pixeling.

The reason some members of Netflix are worried about the situation is that – in addition to being able to access only sub-optimal video quality – the company sets different rates depending on the quality of the video. The entry-level basic plan provides only SD-streaming; The standard layer of bi-stream provides HD quality; And the four-stream premium plan offers up to Ultra HD for selected content.

Netflix’s bit-rate trolling is “clearly visible from my 65-inch LED,” Anders Nike, a Netflix customer in Sweden, told Diversity. “Some headlines are awesome … meanwhile they keep charging normal rates.”

In a post on Reddy on Monday, Netflix users in the Netherlands claimed that they are watching 1080p HD movie bit rates ranging from 0.8 Mbps to 1.5 Mbps per second, while Ultra HD 4K movies are at 7.5 Mbps. By the way, Netflix’s proposed bandwidth minimum is 5 Mbps for HD video and 25 Mbps for Ultra HD quality. They added, “I’m paying for a 4K subscription and far from my money … As of today, most European countries have eased their quarantines, so is it time for customers not to pay more?”

For now, Netflix does not have a deadline for when bit rates in Europe will return to their highest levels.

“As network conditions improve, we will begin to roll out the bit-rate caps that we introduced nationwide in March,” the company said in a statement. Diversity. “Over the past two months, we’ve connected four times more than usual to help meet the growing demand and help maintain the quality of our services for members.”

In a March 21 blog post, Conte Florence, VP of Netflix at Content Delivery, assured customers that they would still “get the quality of the video you provide”. According to the executive, it continues to provide specific video resolutions for HD (1920 x 1080) and Ultra HD (3840 x 2160), although it has “removed high-bandwidth streams.” However, Florence acknowledged, “If you specifically improve the quality of the video, you may notice a slight decrease in quality between each resolution.”

Netflix’s bit rate trolling came at the urging of EU Commissioner for Internal Markets Thierry Breton, who feared that ISPs in the EU would suffer irresistible strain due to millions of quarts sitting at home. Other video players followed YouTube, Disney Plus, and Amazon Prime Video as targets for bandwidth reduction.

According to Barek, the European Union’s telecom regulator, European Internet networks have managed to increase traffic congestion without major congestion with only a few “local and temporary” issues. On May 8, the agency said that a recent BREC report on the power status of the Internet “shows that traffic across the EU remains mostly stable.”

And yet Netflix continues to insult Videoman by disappointing customers with low bit-rate streaming.

One customer in America last week Tweets An episode of “Isolated” only aired in HD at 0.47 Mbps. Dissatisfied Netflix subscribers wrote, “Beware of the crepe service offered during Covid-19.

Juan Jesus, a Netflix subscriber in Spain, Tweets Earlier this week, Netflix posted an image with a bit rate of 0.51 Mbps on the HD stream on its customer support account. “What’s the use of 1080p resolution with this ridiculous bitrate? The quality is really bad,” Jesse wrote. Netflix pointed him to an article on video-quality issues – not to mention the company’s bandwidth-throttling policies.