This past week, Netflix made their service available to consumers in more than a 100 countries, including Malaysia. And many Malaysians responded with excitement and signed up for an account, hoping that it would give them the unalienable right to overuse the popular term “Netflix and chill”. It doesn’t—however, that shouldn’t stop you from binge-watching episodes of House of Cards.
While the basic use of Netflix might be sufficient for the average basic user, here are a few hacks that real TV heads can make use of to get the most out of their Netflix accounts.
1. The Netflix Bible
As soon as you get a Netflix account, one of the main dilemmas that you’d have to address is the issue of finding the right series or the right movie to watch. To help you with this crisis, you can make use of the Netflix Id Bible. Although, Netflix is getting better at predicting what you’d like to watch, sometimes it just doesn’t get it right.
So you can simply navigate to this url below and replace the “INSERTNUMBER” with any of these codes. For example, 43040 will give you a list of action comedies, 7442 for adventures, 1181 for adult animation, and so on and so forth.
http://www.netflix.com/browse/genre/INSERTNUMBER
2. Flix Roulette
Say you finished a complete series by the end of a long weekend, and you have absolutely no idea about what you should watch next. If you’re feeling adventurous, you can head over to Flix Roulette and have it pick a movie or a TV show for you.
The simple platform enables you to limit the results by allowing you to pick the genre, the rating, among other filters. It would then pick out a random one within those parameters. Although, I should add this wouldn’t be as fun as letting it pick a random flick from a wide range of genres.
3. Get Smart
A common issue that you might face with a Netflix account here in Malaysia is that you’re not given access to all the series and movies on the platform. This can be quite disheartening after all one of the main reasons behind why you’d opt for a Netflix account is to get a taste of the things that the West has to offer.
However, that shouldn’t phase you much. There are numerous ways of getting around things by making use of VPN or you can make use of a service called Smartflix. Currently available for download on the Mac (it’s sad but Windows users just don’t deserve cool stuff), it’s a service that gives you access to the entire Netflix catalogue of more than 14,000 movies and TV shows anywhere in the world.
In essence, it’s just a simple application that combines an index of Netflix content available worldwide, an optimised proxy service and a chromeless web browser that embeds the Netflix web player.
4. Hack your buffering speed
If you’re enraged by your slow Internet connection and the constant buffering of your videos, then you can hack your way onto Netflix’s hidden streaming features and adjust your buffering settings to suite your binge session better.
According to thrillist.com, you can hold Shift + Alt + Left Click (Windows), Hold Down Shift + Opt + Left Click (Mac) to bring a menu called Diagnostics. You can then select stream manager, manual selection and then change your buffering rate.
Higher rates usually mean better quality but if you’re having a slow Internet day, you have to make such a sacrifice.
5. Netflix and Work
While every basic user knows how to Netflix and Chill, only the real legendary experts know how to Netflix and Work. But if you think that this involves switching from your browser to your work window every time your manager walks by, then you’re wrong—there’s a better option, and one that provides you with a much stealthier solution.
You can download the Helium browser that’s only available for the Mac (read: the cool kids), and it’s a transparent browser that hovers over your desktop while you work. Once you download it, you can enable the transparency option and set an appropriate level of opacity. Set the right one and you’ll be able to watch your favourite series at work without raising any suspicions.
6. The Netflix Enhancement
This free Netflix add-on for Chrome will make your streaming habits that much better. As soon as you install it, you will have access to 1MDB profiles, trailers and ratings from Metacritic and Rotten Tomatoes. This extension will always stay on top of your browser and provide you with all the much-needed information before you pick your next binge series victim.
7. Rabbit
Couples in long distance relationships that Netflix together, stay together. Actually no, they don’t, they end up breaking up anyway but that’s no reason as to why you shouldn’t try and make your relationship work.
If you’re in a long distance relationship and you’d still like to maintain the whole aura of “Netflix and Chill”, you can sign up for Rabbit. It’s a service that enables you to watch your favourite shows with your friends, without being in the same room or the same city. You can use this platform while your away from loved ones and you can still continue watching your favourite series together.
These are just a few ways you can hack your Netflix experience and enjoy watching series and movies on a whole another level. If you know any other hacks that are much cooler than the ones in this list, do mention in them in the comments and share them with all the other TV series addicts.