By Gavin Boyle
During Warner Bros. Discovery’s (WBD) Q1 report, executives at the company explained how they have already begun to roll out their password sharing crackdown and the initiatives they will take to ramp up the process.
“It’s going to increase and really be a 12- to 18-month initiatives as it rolls out to more subscriber cohorts here in the U.S and globalizes later in the year and into ‘26 and as the messaging on the password sharing gets more assertive over the course of the back half of the year,” WBD head of streaming JB Perrette said during an earnings call, per Deadline.
The company’s soft rollout has already begun. In April, WBD released the option to add an additional member outside of the household, allowing users to share their account with one extra member. This feature costs $7.99 per month, compared to $9.99 for the most basic Max plan.
“Extra member Add-On and Profile Transfer are two key Max advancements, designed to help viewers with a new way to enjoy out best-in-class content at an exceptional value, and offer subscribers greater flexibility in managing their accounts,” Perrette said when the features were added. “These updates provide a simple way for subscribers to add-on a new member to their account, or for existing subscribers who have users outside of their household to smoothly, and in an uninterrupted fashion, transition their profile so that [an] extra member can continue to access Max.”
Related: Yet Another Streamer Is Cracking Down on Password Sharing
With Max now having an official way to add a member, WBD will move on to the next phase of the password crackdown with messaging to users it has identified as violating its policies.
“This is an art and a science to try and tighten the filter of who’s in there…” Perrette said last December. “As we go through ‘25, you’re going to see the filters get tighter and tighter.”
WBD expects the crackdown to boost both subscriber numbers and profit as those mooching off a Max account are forced to sign up and pay. Though the company has been careful to temper these expectations — especially as Netflix has found unbelievable success through its crackdown — the introduction of the Extra Member features seems to already be paying off. In Q4, Max added 5.3 million subscribers, although much of this growth is attributed to its launch in Australia and Turkey.
Nonetheless, subscriber numbers are expected to continue to grow as its soft messaging to those sharing passwords becomes harsher and they convert free riders into paying subscribers.
Read Next: Here’s What Boosted Warner Bros. Discovery’s Largest Monthly Viewing Increase
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