Netflix | AppleVis

Description of App

Looking for the most talked about TV shows and movies from the around the world? They’re all on Netflix.

We’ve got award-winning series, movies, documentaries, and stand-up specials. And with the mobile app, you get Netflix while you travel, commute, or just take a break.

What you’ll love about Netflix:

• We add TV shows and movies all the time. Browse new titles or search for your favorites, and stream videos right on your device.

• The more you watch, the better Netflix gets at recommending TV shows and movies you’ll love.

• Create up to five profiles for an account. Profiles give different members of your household their own personalized Netflix.

• Enjoy a safe watching experience just for kids with family-friendly entertainment.

• Preview quick videos of our series and movies and get notifications for new episodes and releases.

• Save your data. Download titles to your mobile device and watch offline, wherever you are.

Version

16.9.1

Free or Paid

Free With In-App Purchase

Apple Watch Support

Device(s) App Was Tested On

iPhone

iOS Version

17.2

Accessibility Comments

Appears to be very accessible and easy to use.

VoiceOver Performance

VoiceOver reads all page elements.

Button Labeling

All buttons are clearly labeled.

Usability

The app is fully accessible with VoiceOver and is easy to navigate and use.

App Store Link

https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/netflix/id363590051?mt=8&ign-mpt=uo%3D4

Developer's Website

http://netflix.com

Developer's Twitter Username

@netflix

Recommendations

9 people have recommended this app

Most recently recommended by Rafaela Freundt 2 years 1 month ago

Options

Comments

I have had success with this app....

To anyone who is interested in trying, the main way to make this app work is to use the slyding navigation (sliding your finger around the app) rather than left and right flicks. The reason for this is because all the elements of this app are accessible, but for some strange reason you can't click on anything. For this reason, what I have done that has had consistent success is to glide until you find an area or item you wish to click, then leave your finger there but lift it slightly off the surface of the iphone/ipad, triple-click the home button (you must allow this to turn voiceover on and off in accessibility settings), tap where your finger just was and then turn voiceover back on. You cannot use flicking gestures for this because you need to have your finger on the screen to keep the place of the item you want to tap once you turn voiceover off. Netflix definitely needs to fix this but for the mean time this has absolutely worked for me.

Good success with this app.

Hi, I have had a fair amount of success with this netflicks app. IAs stated you have to feel around the screen instead of flicking, but I don't have to turn VO off in order to tap stuff and it seems to me like most everything is read.

It's a Drag

I've been using Netflix for about 3 months now. The only way to interact with this app, with Voiceover still active, is to move spatially to the item you want, then double tap. Many screens have more than one page; for example, the Home screen which displays recommendations and recently watched items; search results and genre listings; and full seasons of TV shows. When you encounter a screen that is likely to have multiple information, the usual three-finger swipe up or down will not move through those pages. Instead, to scroll down, you should put your finger at the bottom-most item on the current page; double tap and hold; and then drag your finger upward. This process will scroll through the multipage listing. A word of caution: I actually start scrolling from the second-to-bottommost item, because a few times when I've tried to begin with the bottommost, I've ended up accidentally tapping Genres or Search instead. This kicks you out of whatever listing you're looking at, and if you've already scrolled through several pages of listings it's a real PITA to get back in.

Netflix version 2.0

Found the app to be much more accessible than ever. All buttons are now clearly labeled. Found getting around to be much easier. Had no problem in clicking areas wher there were problems before. They have certainly made major improvements for the accessbility side of it.

Issues with version 2.0?

Strangely, I was listening to a podcast that some people were still having voice over issues with Netflix? I was wondering if anyone else is having this problem? Not sure why but it all to appear to work for me.

Voice Over Support

Netflix v2.1.1 has been released and specifically mention that it is now Add Voice Over Support. I still find the interface to be not so friendly but does indeed work just fine with Voice Over. I do not know what the new Voice Over support are but if you find them please feel free to leave a comment here.

What's New in Version 2.1.1
- Improved artwork for new iPad Retina Display
- Fixed VoiceOver support
- Improved playback on external displays
- Numerous fixes and stability improvements

Version 2.2

The Netflix is still a work in progress. They are slowly making things a bit more accessible. Done a great job in making sure all of the content and labels are voice over friendly. However, the interface is still rather clumsy and hard to navigate. It can be used if you are willing to figure out some of the weird ways in how to do a variety of things. The Home tab just seem just one long huge list. I would like to see them sectionalize things a bit better so going through a list is easier to do so. The player can be weird when you are watching an TV episodes that contains many shows. It is a learning curve to understand where and how to use things. I don't even bother with the Instant Queue. Seems unfriendly for me. Be glad to what others think of the interface besides me? What's New in Version 2.2 - Enhancements to the player user interface - Ability to select audio language when available (requires iOS 5.0 or greater) - General performance improvements

My Thoughts

I use this app quite a bit, and am completely blind, and yes, it has a long way to go to be fully compatible with Voiceover. A few hints that might help. When attempting to navigate your queue or a list of episodes for a TV show, turn Voiceover off and swipe up, than turn Voiceover back on, the list will have scrolled down yes, this is a pain but the only work around I have figured out to get to certain episodes or to scroll through my queue. I forget if a right finger click will get you through your entire queue or if it gets caught at the bottom of the current page. The best way I have found to navigate your queue is by using the item chooser menu. And yes, it will pull up a lot of strange things such as several PG or R ratings and times of movies, you just have to work around them if you want to use this app. I have not noticed any voiceover improvements in their latest updates to the app even though in one of them they claimed their were voiceover improvements. I have yet to find a way to get VO to work with rewind or fast forwarding, I can pause and play when watching something and that is about it. Half the time I have to hit play two to three times to get a movie to restart. Finally, I know they recently added subtitles as an option in the player, and that the hearing impaired is suing Netflix to provide Close Captioning options in the app. Would be nice if the blind were included in that lawsuit so that if a movie has audio description on the physical DVD that should be an option to view in their app, but of course this is just a dream of mine.

Scrolling

scrolling works perfectly now, with no app update necessary. Keep in mind that Netflix uses what's called a dynamic UI, so they can change things on the interface without having to push an entirely new version of the app to the store. However, some things are still problematic, but that could just be me wanting the tabs across the bottom to say 'tab, X of X, instead of just 'Home', Instant Queue, etc.

TV shows globally

Does anyone know if the TV shows available are global or just American?

Navigation

I have started using NetFlix for iPad very frequently and I have figured out a lot about the navigation which used to baffle me. I just thought I would share my insights here: First of all, I think it is important for those who are blind to understand contextually how the screen on the iPad Netflix app is layed out. The home screen has different sections that start with title headers. Underneath each heading (i.e. Resume watching, your queue, etc.) is a horizontal strip which displays a graphical thumbnail image of the movie or TV episode and the title. These are listed as a single row from left to right and continue off the right side of the screen. Each subheading or section is represented by a single horizontal strips of these thumbnail images. As mentioned above, you cannot use the gesture based navigation at all. This app only responds to the spacial or contextual navigation (sliding your finger around the screen). The easiest way to navigate the strips of movies or TV shows is when you get to the far right side of the screen and you want to continue browsing, double tap and hold and then slide your finger to the left. This pushes the thumbnails over and reveals a new set of thumbnails representing the next movies or TV shows in the list for that section only. Please note that the strip moves over only as much as your finger, so you will want to move as far to the right as you can, double tap and hold, and then slide as far to the left as you can to reveal the most new thumbnails. When dealing with TV shows, there is an extra level of complexity involved. Once you select a TV show thumbnail, a popup window appears on top of the screen you were just in and displays the list of episodes. IN order to navigate this popup, you have to understand again how it is layed out. The controls of importance are the list control of the episodes of a specific season, the season selector button and the play button. The season selection button is self-explanatory, but you must find it with your finger....you cannot use gestures to simply swipe left or right until you reach it. It is towards the center from the top and slightly to the left. Once you double tap this, the list of seasons come up and you double tap the one you want. Then you are taken back to the list of episodes which is now reflective of the season you chose. Once you double tap the episode you want, it does not start it, it only highlights that episode visually. You have to then navigate to the play button in order to actually start the episode. My apologies to those who may already know this, but it was not articulated specifically here so I thought I would mention it. I have found netflix to be fairly accessible now even though the navigation is somewhat cumbersome. You just need to know how to interact with the UI. Netflix needs to make the improvement that allows the app to respond to the voiceover cursor rather than forcing you to spacially identify where you are double-tapping. Hopefully this will help. I have found these methods work consistently.

Version 2.3, 17 September

Just wondered if anyone has updated to version 2.3 released today? I have begun using the app a lot on my iPad since the recent usability improvements, but wonder if the UI changes mentioned in the update description have broken it again. I hope not.

Version 2.3

Well, they have certainly changed the UI once again and one again flicking left and right will not work still. That is no different from the previous versions but the UI has changed. It is no longer the movie on the left side and the play button on the right. So you will now see the movie follow by another line of the play button. You will still have to use your fingers to navigate around. So it is cumbersome that you havp scrolling with your three fingers up and down rather use the standard flicking. I've notice that in the play mode under the Languages button it now has Audio? Have I not seen this before? Some of the movies I've looked at are greyed out. So does that mean certainly movies have the Audio Description? Not sure. Love to see if other found anything of it? What's New in Version 2.3 - Updated UI - Varied improvements on playback, AV sync, subtitle handling .

Flicking

Flicking works for me. I have no problems whatsoever. As far as the audio thing, yes, only certain movies have that.

Version 3.0

The new Netflix v3.0 has now been released.

Sadly, it comes with a cost to the visually impaired community. There are unfortunetly some new issues with this release. for you to be advised.

The major release has not changed the layout at all in what we have already grown with.

The existing set of rows still has the same carosel style features. This alone already make this a bit hard to use but it can be tolerable once you have mastered in how to use them correctly.

They have added a new feature which unfortunely have made things even harder to use now. Once again if you are wanting to play a show or a movie. We used to have the option just to double tap on the Play button.

The new method is that this no longer take you straight to your movie or the show you want to watch. What it does now is that it brings up a pop-up menu which you not be able to find by flicking to the left nor to the right.

You have to touch around the screen to find this new pop-up menu called the Play On. So far in what I can say is that I have found this pop-up to be consistant in two areas but you will have to play in a new game called "Where is the Play On Menu?".

The first place to try is at the bottom of the screen. Once again, you will need to tap at the bottom of the screen just above the Home button. This is not readable nor found if you use the standard gestures of flicking to the left or to the right. This can only be found by tapping for it on the screen.

The other place in which I have found is about 2/3 the way down your device screen.

So again, you will only find this new pop-up Play On menu is by touching and tapping around the screen. For odd reasons they will not be found by using the usual gestures as you would expect to use which is the flicking to the left and right.

Now that we know where to find the Play On menu. You are given two options. It will first give you the device that you have the Netflix installed on. So in my case I am using my iPhone. So the first options is the iPhone. The second option is your account name. Not certain in what this does. However, now by double tapping on the iPhone. It will now start the movie or the show you are wanting to watch.

At times I may have to do this twice because nothing will ever happen. It just sits there. Generally, the second time does the charm and start with the show.

So once the show starts to play. The usual case of the Video Controls will go and hide as you would expect. The next problem that I am now having is that it isn't easy to get those Video Controls to show back up! Not sure but it takes me awhile and a lot of tapping before I will get any response. I can sit there and double tap on it as you would expect for the Video Controls to come back up but isn't doing so for me.

The only good part is that once you have the Video Controls back they are easy to navigate around.

So with that. That is the review of the newNetflix v3.0. I would greatly appreicate if others could report on here if they are having the same problems that I am experiencing with the lack of response of getting the Video Controls to show up. Plus, if you find that the new pop-up Play On menu is bothersome as it is for me?

So I can only say be advise of some of the new issues in this release. Keep in mind it can be tolerable if you are willing to put up the issues. I can still navigate around as I could before and was able to find ways around the problem. However, I'm afraid to report this new release has only taken a step back in what I would consider being Fully Accessible.

What's New in Version 3.0

We enhanced the player UI for a better playback experience.

1. See the Title in the iPad player UI - Touch the player UI screen to see the title of movie/TV show you are watching
2. Zoom icon is back - so you can now control when you watch full screen mode
3. Note better placement of play/pause and Back-10 buttons so you can easily control your experience

To report issues, please contact us at mobilesupport@netflix.com

Netflix issues

Hello, I have some good news about the netflix app and the issues we are having. I e-mailed them back about a month or to ago, and they got back to me, and they told me that they were aware of the issues we were having with voiceover a Net Flix Mobile engineer got back to me, and here where h his response, and mine, I erge everyone who are having issues like this to e-mail them Dominique G. Subject: Issues with voiceover and netflix for iPhone. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- JAN 04, 2013 | 01:29PM PST Bertrand Mollinier Toublet replied: Hello Dominique, thank you for reporting these issues. We are aware of the problem and will be scheduling a fix. -- Netflix Mobile Engineering Team -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- DEC 13, 2012 | 07:24AM PST Original message Dominique wrote: Hello, my name is Dominique, and I have been using your net flix app for a while now!! I can say that the service and app is wonderful!!! but their are some accessibility issues with the voiceover screenreader that comes for all the IOS devices. So, here is my issue, I can browse, searchh, view what's in the instant cue, but when I go to click on the show,nothing happens, it just stays on the same screen if a sighted person does it with voice over turned off, this doesn't happen. Also, when clicking a movie or tv show or episode to watch where it says click to watch, voiceover just sits there and stays on the same screen, unless someone sighted turns off voiceover and clicks on that said item for me. It also does this in the suggestions thing as well. I'm using the latest version of net flix on a Verizon iPhone 4, latest IOS update installed. This issue started when the interface was changed around. I like the interface, it works very well with voiceover, its just when clicking certain elements or buttons on the screen when voiceover doesn't interact with them properly. I hope this information was helpful!! I can also bee reached by twitter @ImmaBeastWitIt also, I'd like to try a beta version of the update with the accessibility issues fixed, if that can be done. I hope this information helps!! :)

Could you provide an email address for us to submit issues?

If possible, it would be beneficial to post an email address (iff allowed and possible) so that others can submit messages in order to help make the issues you have mentioned a higher priority.

Multiple profile accounts

Hi all,
How does one continue to watch a show after signing into the latest version on an app/ For me it says continue to watch for Orin, the show buttons, but double tapping on these buttons does nothing.
The "continue to watch" buttons that Melissa demonstrates in her podcast don't appear for me, and I'm dragging my finger around exploring by touch and for multiple profiles on the same account it must be different.

RE: Multiple profile accounts

Hello Orinks:

I, too, have a love/hate relationship with Netflix. After reading your comment I just double checked the app to see what happens for me. Sometimes when I do a single-finger, double-tap on an item that is located in the Continue Watching section, it will automatically open the show and start the next episode in line. Other times it simply does nothing. In this case, all I do is conduct a new search for the same show, for example, today, Star Trek Voyager wouldn't open. A fresh search brings up the show and then you can go from there to start the next episode. It's a work-around that has been successful for me.

Hope this helps.

Workarounds

I cancelled my Netflix subscription for this exact reasoning. Whilst using the app, I did find a work around, though. While exploring with touch, find the show you want to watch. You must find the exact positioning visually on the screen, else this will not work. I found this a bit tricky; I had to tap around experimentally for quite a bit, especially with shows and movies that were written in small font. Take your finger off the screen, then tap exactly where the show is visually. VO should speak the show title. Once it does, double tap and it should open.
This isn't a proven method, but it did work for me quite a bit.

So does anyone have any new

So does anyone have any new work-arounds for the ios app? Also we need to politely contact netflix and tell them their app and website need work. I'm on an account with a friend. I would not pay these people jack until they made a concerted effort to improve their services. They are pushing for audio description but they need to make their apps voiceover compatible and improve the website accessibility and the android app I'd imagine as well before they go pushing that too hard.

accessibility of the mobile apps and the website

I have not tried out the iPad app, but the iPhone app doesn't seem to be very accessible. The search button isn't even labeled, in fact, it's not even mislabeled. VoiceOver doesn't even say anything when on that button. As for the options listed on the main screen, such as the genres, double tapping on them doesn't seem to do much, even if you drag your finger around the screen. Again, this might just be an iPhone 6 Plus issue with the app, but regardless, it could use some improvement. I find it ironic how Netflix is pushing for audio description for as service which isn't fully accessible on most platforms. I'm assuming that Netflix is aware of these issues we are reporting to them, considering they are aware we want audio described movies and TV Shows.

newest version 7213005353

This version is usable with voice over and audio description.
One big improvement over the last version is that you can set the "audio description" once in the "language settings" and it will now "stick" for all shows. (before you had to turn this on for each offering) The drawbacks are the glitches, the issue of the double tap not working on a selection is still around, but you can get around it by either restarting the app, or just using the "search" and putting the title in to select what you wish to watch. The "scrubber" (progress bar) is still not accessible with voice over. (this I find odd because the versions before audio description, the scrubber worked perfectly with voice over)

Their website with JAWS is still horrendous, but a little better if you go to Netflix.com/browse/audio-description then select your title from there.

Can't even sign up!!!

I got through the intro screens and entered my email address and password. But I have tried all suggested techniques and can not get the checkbox to check to agree with conditions and say I am 18. The register button works fine but that doesn't matter because I am just told i have to agree with the conditions first. Trying to restrain myself in case i have overlooked something obvious but i'm on the verge of being really angry!

even the website doesn't work!

I got the brilliant idea that I would go to the website on my Mac to create my account. Got through setting up everything and got to that last step of agreeing. There isn't even a checkbox I can see with voiceover on safari. Tried a mouse click where the agree statement is and then clicked start membership but i'm sitting here looking at the notice that tells me i have to acknowledge that I agree first. Will have to try with another browser or on my iPhone in safari next. This is nuts!

got it working - after a fashion!

just kept playing around with my trackpad on the Mac until i finally apparently checked the invisible checkbox and got my membership completed. Still had trouble working with the iPhone app. Was finally able to choose a movie on the mac. Once it was playing in safari on the Mac I was also able to get it started on the iPhone. Will have to go through all the podcasts and see if there's an easier way to do things. At this point I would hardly call Netflix on my iPhone 6+ accessible; maybe useable if you are determined and willing to spend a lot of time on it. useable is beter than nothing but a lot less than truly accessible.

There has been a huge

There has been a huge improvement in accessibility. I have to borrow my brothers chromecast to see if the player while streaming to the tv has also improved or not.

Version 8.0.0

What's New in Version 8.0.0

• Post-Play experience (episode auto-play/recommendations) now on iPhone
• iPad Pro optimized layout
• 3D Touch support
• Improved Kids experience on iPad
• Arabic support for devices running iOS 9 and later
• Performance improvements

Accessibility improvements

I like the improved accessibility in this latest version. For example swiping left or right to move through items now works as expected everywhere... I also can watch movies and change settings without any problems. I haven't fully played with it but over all good job Netflix! :)

On version 8.1.0 I still can

On version 8.1.0 I still can't rate titles. The rest is fully accessible as far as I know.

Rating screen is still totally blank to voiceover

Yes, the ratings screen is still totally inaccessible to Voiceover. It speaks absolutely nothing on the screen. But, the worst part of that is that once you're in the ratings area, I can find no way to back out of it and return to my previous Netflix app screen. I have to Open the App Switcher and close the Netflix app then re-start it again to get back to its home screen.

This is the only accessibility bug I've found, though. Many thanks again to the Netflix app developer(s) for their hard work.)

Would auto locking the screen save you data?

If you start a show with the Netflix app. Then lock the screen and then press the sleep wake button and then double tap with two fingers to resume the show and finally lock the screen again would this save you any data at all? The reason I'm asking this is because once I did all the above, I got someone sighted to look at the screen and they said that the picture was frozen. Presumably from where I last locked the screen for the second time. What do you all think?

The app has been updated, but

The app has been updated, but you still can`t access the rating screen. The rest seemps prety accessible

Version 8.3.0

What's New in Version 8.3.0

- Create, update, and delete profiles within the app
- Improved navigation for VoiceOver users
- Fixed a number of crashing issues
- Bug fixes throughout

audio description

Also with the latest update, I've noticed that now VoiceOver will say if something has audio description. For example, Play Keith Richards: Under the Influence. This video has audio descriptions enabled. Which I think is a nice touch for voiceover users. In addition to whatever else has been fixed.

RE: Audio Description

Although as indicated, you will have VoiceOver tell you if a programme has audio description, I have discovered that the absence of this label does not necessarily mean that there is no audio description. I looked on the web site, using the browse audio description link, and it shows films and TV shows as having audio description which the IOS app does not indicate as having it.

So I'd advise people to still use the web site as the definitive source for which programmes have audio description.

Thanks

Thank you for the info. I hope they can fix the rating screen with VoiceOver. I found a workaround to rate titles so netflix knows what to suggest me, but I would like to do it from the app.

most recent update of Netflix

having finally started using Netflix I can say that I’m very impressed. Unfortunately I’ve come upon a slight issue.

when I tap on a film to find the information about it I am unable to return to the previous page. This forces me to close the app via the app switcher, open it again and find my place again which I find very tedious. does anyone else have this problem and have a workaround?

thanks.

Close button

There is a close button at the top right corner of the show page, but voiceover lists it at the end of the page. To find it just touch the battery and go down.

Thanks

Thanks a lot.:-)

Problems with version 11.15.2

Running the latest version of the Netflix app and I am having several problems with it: The headings on the home screen of the app seem to have disappeared. Items are poorly labeled or have no title. Some buttons do not appear to activate when double tapped. the search screen works, but that is not my preferred way to locate items. I like to browse. Has anyone else noticed these issues?