Netflix might be about to start allowing video downloads

(Image credit: Getty Images)

TV bingers, rejoice: Netflix is rumored to be seriously considered allowing users to download its videos.

"We know from our sources within the industry that Netflix is going to launch this product," says Dan Taitz, COO of video software company Penthera. "My expectation is that by the end of the year Netflix will be launching download-to-go as an option for their customers." His gossip was echoed by Dan Rayburn, an analyst at technology research firm Frost & Sullivan.

Netflix itself declined to comment on the rumors Friday, though in April Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said the online streaming giant would "keep an open mind" about downloads. That's a significantly different message from the comments made by Netflix chief product officer Neil Hunt in September, when he posited that offering consumers additional choices — stream vs. download — can paralyze them into not choosing to watch anything at all.

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Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.