Netflix to re-encode entire catalogue

Online streaming giant aiming to slash data usage and improve picture quality.

Online streaming giant Netflix is aiming to re-encode its entire back catalogue, in a bid to slash user data usage and improve picture quality.

In a process that has already taken four years so far, Netflix, based in Los Gatos, California, has been busy formulating a new algorithm that would use different rules for different content.

According to Variety magazine, Netflix’s efforts to refine its video decoding algorithms, which it “realised it had gotten all wrong” in 2011, are already delivering bandwidth savings of 20 per cent.

“You shouldn’t allocate the same amount of bits for My Little Pony as for The Avengers,” Netflix video algorithms manager Anne Aaron told Variety.

The new approach, which has already been silently tested to randomly selected customers, is more flexible, and each title gets its own encoding settings.

Until now, each TV show or movie had the same rules applied to it, even though an animated show for example could be reproduced with far less data than a complex fast-paced action show.

The move to apply this approach to Netflix’s entire catalogue might have dramatic implications in Australia, which is ranked 18 on a list of 29 countries for Neflix speeds.

“Performance for Australian ISPs was impacted by consumer demand exceeding the forecasts Netflix provided,” Netflix said on its blog.

“We are working closely with these ISPs and expect performance to improve in the coming months.”

Netflix recently hit one million users in Australia just eight months after launch.

Somewhat controversially, Netflix signed unmetered deals with Optus and iiNet in Australia to offer customers with those ISPs the ability to watch as much Netflix as they want without it counting towards their data caps. The streaming service later chilled on the idea, saying it regretted those deals.

In March when Netflix launched in Australia, it said it wants to be in one third of all Australian homes within seven years.

Overall it has 69 million subscribers worldwide.

Netflix Australia has been contacted for further comment.