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<p>NEW YORK &#8212; How much is too much for streaming video?</p><p>A dramatic slowdown in worldwide growth at Netflix &#8212; including the first quarterly drop in its U.S. subscribers since 2011 &#8212; is raising questions about just how much are people willing to pay for streaming services. Especially with a host of new ones from Disney, Apple and others on their way.</p><p>A recent price increase seems to have spooked Netflix subscribers. The company lost 126,000 subscribers in the U.S., less than 1% of its 60.1 million paid U.S. subscriptions, during the April-June period. Its most popular plan rose from $11 to $13 in a U.S. price hike announced in January and rolled out for many subscribers during the second quarter. Worldwide, the service picked up 2.7 million worldwide subscribers, far below Netflix&#8217;s forecast of 5 million.</p><p>&#8220;Netflix raising prices prompted people to think about whether they were getting value for money,&#8221; Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter said.</p><p>While people are willing to shell out for several services to meet their streaming needs, he said, they&#8217;re also willing to cancel if they&#8217;re not using it enough, just as they would with a gym membership or a subscription to the New Yorker magazine.</p><p>Streaming services preparing to compete with Netflix appear to be taking note.</p><p>Disney Plus, set to debut in November, will already be cheaper than Netflix at $8 a month, though Disney Plus will also have a smaller video library. Hulu has cut prices to $6 from $8 for its main, ad-supported service. Services from Apple, due out this year, and WarnerMedia and NBCUniversal, out in 2020, don&#8217;t have announced prices yet, although the NBCUniversal service will be free and ad supported for traditional cable TV subscribers.</p><p>Of course, even if these individual services are cheaper than Netflix, it&#8217;s not clear how many consumers will be willing to pay for.</p><p>One way to make a service appealing is not through better prices but through exclusive shows and deep libraries, including shows that Netflix will be losing. Netflix&#8217;s two most popular shows, &#8220;Friends&#8221; and &#8220;The Office,&#8221; will be departing in the coming months for rival services.</p><p>Group M analyst Brian Weiser said that for now, other services shouldn&#8217;t be overly concerned by a weak quarter or two at Netflix. He said streaming content consumption is still growing rapidly, so the overall market has plenty of room for competitors. And the streaming arena is a growth area in the much bigger and more mature entertainment industry.</p><p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t think it follows that if Netflix has an underperforming quarter that tells you about others,&#8221; he said.</p><p>Some analysts also believe Netflix&#8217;s trouble is temporary.</p><p>Canaccord Genuity analyst Michael Graham said the subscriber numbers will likely hit the stock in the short term &#8212; the stock was down 11% in midday trading Thursday &#8212; but overall the company&#8217;s growth remains on track, particularly overseas.</p><p>&#8220;We still see a strong content strategy and room to add large numbers of international subscriptions as key strengths going forward,&#8221; he wrote in a note to investors.</p><p>Similarly, Pivotal Research Group analyst Jeffrey Wlodarczak said investors shouldn&#8217;t make a &#8220;mountain out of a molehill,&#8221; with the most recent quarterly figures.</p><p>The spring quarter is typically sluggish for the streaming service, and Netflix acknowledged a weak content slate could have been partly responsible for the drop. It expects to regain some momentum this summer, projecting that it will add 7 million subscribers from July through September. The optimism stems in part from the immense popularity of &#8220;Stranger Things,&#8221; whose third season attracted record viewership after its July 4 release.</p><p>Netflix has said it welcomes competition. It ended June with 151.6 million worldwide subscribers, far more than a current crop of video streaming rivals that includes Amazon and Hulu.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Netflix said subscribers dropped unexpectedly in the U.S. during the second quarter, raising the question of how much are people willing to pay for streaming services with a host of new ones, from Disney to NBCUniversal, on the way. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/07/web1_123235438-a241ef4b2112435bbe97b627820bed6d.jpg</photo0><caption0>Netflix said subscribers dropped unexpectedly in the U.S. during the second quarter, raising the question of how much are people willing to pay for streaming services with a host of new ones, from Disney to NBCUniversal, on the way. </caption0><photoCredit0>AP photo </photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><subheadMeta>Netflix suffers subscriber drop</subheadMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Mae Anderson</p><p>AP Technology Writer</p></bylineMeta></div>

Netflix subscriber drop hints at streaming-service fatigue