The headline of this article seems ridiculous. There has never been an indication that Netflix was dying the company is still worth billions of dollars and has hundreds of millions of paying subscribers. That did not stop hoards of bloggers and “experts” from proclaiming that the impending demise of Netflix after the company had its first bad quarter in years. The truth is Netflix is doing fine and the company actually launched an important and interesting feature called profile transfer.

At the heart of Netflix’s viewing experience are profiles

Netflix allows its users to create their own profiles under one account. This allows multiple people to easily watch shows using one account. Everyone can for example watch Stranger Things at their own pace, picking up where they left off and getting personal recommendations. The problem is that whenever you want to open your own Netflix account you lose your viewing history, ratings and recommendations and have to start from scratch. That is extremely annoying and is one reason some people still use their parent’s or ex’s Netflix accounts. Profile transfer changes all that. The feature allows you to transfer your profile complete with your viewing history to a new account.

It’s not an act of kindness

Netflix is not doing this out of the kindness of its own heart. The company has also announced that it will start cracking down on password sharing soon. It would make little sense to force people to open their own accounts when there is no easy way for them to take their own data with them. This is Netflix’s latest trick to try and boost their subscriber numbers. This and launching a cheaper ad-supported plan. According to Netflix, the profile transfer plan will be launched slowly over the coming days. So do not be surprised if its not available to you yet.