If you’re like me, then the working week is a whirlwind of early mornings and late evenings all combined into one long and seemingly never ending research project! But also like me, you must at some point give in to your biology and take a breather, chill-out or put our feet-up. And if like me you like to spend some of that feet-up time catching up on TV shows and watching films, then there’s almost nothing better than Netflix for doing so.
And I can personally vouch for the fact, that watching your favourite show whilst stuffing your face with chocolate or pizza is fine as long as you don’t binge! Oh and if you’re looking for ways to make your Netflix experience a little less ordinary, here’s a few ways in which you can do just that.
7 Ways to Hack Netflix
1. Control the amount of data you’re using:
If you didn’t know that Netflix was a huge eater of Data STOP! It is probably one of the worst streaming services for just that, especially if you’re watching on a smartphone or tablet.
Did you know that watching an hour of HD video will set you back an entire 3G of data? Fortunately there is a way in which you can work around it and save yourself some money and your data allowance.
You can do this by heading over to My Account, and look for the Playback settings. Once you’ve entered them you will see the option to choose what video quality you use and exactly how much data you use.
2. Turn off Play Next Episode Automatically
If you look in the image above, directly above the save button bottom left. You will see that “Play the next episode automatically” is ticked. All you have to do now is remove the tick and Netflix will never again be able to force you to watch the next episode of your favourite show again!
3. Use Netflix Roulette
If you’re in one of those moods when you can’t find anything to watch, some programmes and films look interesting but not quite interesting enough. That’s when you should take advantage of the Netflix roulette feature. It picks programmes and films at random for you to watch, and only gives you limited options for filtering.
4. Hide Your Viewing History
There’s a good chance that you share your Netflix subscription with family members, so there’s probably a good reason for you to hide your history. Especially if you partake to the odd night of Netflix and chill!
Fortunately, there is a way in which you can delete all evidence of what you’ve been watching. To do this you need to login to your Netflix account and go to viewing activity under My Account. Whilst there you should delete any activity and shows, films etc. that you don’t want others to know about.
5. Kick Out the EX
If you started your Netflix experience as part of a loving relationship, but that’s all gone wrong and you’ve managed to retain custody of the account. Now could be the right time to deny the significant other right to use the account.
This is extremely easy to do, just go to settings under My Account and sign out of all other devices. Another more secure method would be to change your password, in-fact this maybe the only way to go as it ads a increased level of certainty that your ex can longer use the account.
6. Discover how people Rate shows without leaving Netflix
Lets say you want to find out what others think about a show before you watch it. Previously you would have had to have left Netflix to do so, but now there is a way for you to stay on the site and find out.
To do this, you will need to download the Chrome browser extension NEhancer. When you have installed it you will be able to see how critics and regular users rate a film or programme, by simply hovering your mouse over it.
7. Unlock Hidden TV Shows and Films
Did you know that there is far more content on Netflix than you are able to see on its home screen?
So if you’re looking for something in-particular and can’t seem to find it, believe me when I say where there is a will there is a way!
Finding what you want exactly is not a difficult as many people think, all you need to know is the correct code to enter at the end of the URL. For example if you want to watch a Zombie horroe move the code at the end would be 75405 and the URl needed would look like this:
netflix.com/browse/genre/75405
If that sounds interesting you can view a full list of codes here.
