Hi Lifehacker, I’m one of the 250,000-odd Australians who already had a US Netflix account prior to its local launch this year. Given that with the exchange rate it’s slightly cheaper in Australia (and that I can switch between the services with a VPN), is there any way I can switch my account over? I don’t want to create a new Australian Netflix account and lose the curated ‘My List’ attached to my US account. Thanks, Islands In The Streaming
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Dear IITS,
There doesn’t appear to be, and it’s not hard to work out why. If you were just talking switching from a US account to an Australian one, you’d hit the wall of difference between each library. The Australian offering is much smaller than the US one, and as such, your curated preferences list isn’t going to match up very well at all with the Australian library.
What you’re after, though, is US content at Australian prices, and again as far as I can see, there’s no way to easily manage that. It’s again not hard to see why Netflix wouldn’t particularly facilitate that, because it’s not going to encourage people to give it less income and have rights holders cranky at it into the bargain. But this is one where there’s just not much good info to be found anywhere, so I’ll throw over to the readership. Any Lifehacker readers managed the US to Oz and then back to US switcheroo successfully?
Cheers
Lifehacker
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23 responses to “Ask LH: Can I Switch My US Netflix Account To Australia?”
Pretty sure this has been tested and while it’s not super quick and easy, it’s achievable. From memory you need to close your US account and end your recurring billing. At the end of your billing cycle you can log into Australian Netflix with the same email / account, and start a new subscription. There’s no way of changing it with an active account however.
Personally I’m leaving it US though, grandfathered into the old plans, so cheaper with multi screen included, unlike the new plans which have multiple levels. Only thing I’m missing is 4k, but as I doubt I’ll see NBN before baby boomer politicians are dead and gone that doesn’t really matter.
This is how you do it. You don’t lose your stuff either. They hold your database for 6 months or something.
I made an account on US Netflix (using PureVPN) a year or two back. Since then, I’ve been easily switching Netflix regions without any trouble. Since then, I’ve unblocked Netflix Latin, Netflix Nordic, Netflix US, Netflix Canada, Netflix Mexico, Netflix Switzerland, Netflix Germany, Netflix Aus/NZ, Netflix France, Netflix Ireland, Netflix Luxembourg and Netflix Belgium.
Still, to double check, I made a thread on Reddit asking about the same thing and people from different countries (UK, Canada, Netherlands, US) have all been easily doing this. All you gotta do is make a Netflix account, get a PureVPN subscription and unblock whatever region you want. It really is as simple as that 🙂
All us Baby Boomers have retired, it’s your mob calling the shots now …. go whinge at them !!!
Officially up to 64, so your 54 born Prime Minister, and orchestrator of the “not labor” clustercrap of a NBN that’s now delayed, more expensive, and outdated technology is most definitely a baby boomer.
I did it the old fashioned way.
Login to Netflix USA and print your rated movies. and List.
Create a new Australian account, as above. And manually go through and rate all of the films.
Its a time sink and not 100% effective, but hey better to know what you’ll be paying each month and that list will update itself over time.
Not sure about others, but I see very little reason to do this. With Netflix’s ‘roaming’ features, the US Netflix account works in any supported country, it just provides content based on the location of the connection.
Works great as I have a VPN set on my tablet to get US Netflix, but have my XB1 receiving AU Netflix, all with the same account. I assume when I make a few trips to NZ later this year my account will work there as well…
Sure you pay a little more due to exchange rates and VPN costs (depending on the user), but this flexibility and access to content is worth it!
I guess the next question to ask (and I an interested to know) is can you use an AU account, and a VPN to get US Netflix? I would assume so but haven’t tried.
Of course. Many people are already doing this.
The reason they want to do this is to access the US Netflix (via a VPN) but pay Australian prices for it (since we’re a bit cheaper, especially once the exchange rate is factored in – and this also avoids currency conversion charges).
You can definitely access US Netflix from an Australian account using a VPN; I’ve done so myself.
I’ve tried that but failed.
What did you do exactly to get the US Netflix through an Australian account?
1. Signed up to Australian Netflix (obviously).
2. Installed the Hola plugin to Firefox. (Warning: Hola is now known to hijack your network connectivity for its own purposes – probably allowing other people to use your connection – so I’d probably recommend a different method. But, at the time, Hola worked for me.)
3. Set my locale in Hola to the US.
4. Logged into Netflix using my Australian credentials.
Basically, Netflix will show you content for the region from which your network connection appears to originate, irrespective of the location where your account was registered. As such, as long as you use a VPN which masks your real IP and makes you appear to be in the US, you should be able to see the US Netflix.
Wrong. Not only that, but how to do it is referenced in the original question. Sign up for an Australian account, then VPN to a US IP Address and enjoy US content at Australian prices.
As for moving your actual account – I’m afraid I believe you have to close it, loose all your preferences, and open a new one.
Ask Netflix?
Since it’s against their terms and conditions to open a US account from Australia, Netflix might just cancel his account outright.
I’m pretty sure I saw someone on Reddit say that they did this not long after Netflix launched in Australia. I think they said they did it via the webchat customer support.
I tried Netflix for a month in 2013 and just cancel the subscription and left the account. When Netflix came to Australia, I just joined again using my email – event got the first month free.
It works no problem. All you have to do is stop your billing and when your month expires, sign up with the same details at Netflix AU. I did it soon after Netflix launched here (support those companies doing the right thing!) and it wasn’t initially obvious.
I ended up contacting support and had a girl on chat within 2 mins that told me they weren’t sure but to try disable your billing and let it expire before reactivating it. I had already tried disable and renable but the let your current sub expire first part is key.
All the preferences came over with the account. My list seems to adjust ok by adding/removing things as required when you region hop.
I have left mine on US pricing as on my plan (4 screens, HD) it actually works out to be about .50c cheaper after exchange rates and international purchase charges on the credit card.
Since we have unmetered Australian Netflix (that only works if you do not use any VPN) we have the Apple TV set up as USA with a VPN and then the PS3 set up as Australian.
I did try to switch to Australian billing at one point, and contacted Netflix about it and they said the same steps above. This proved too hard for me as I am a Gen Y and need instant gratification. I don’t like waiting for my billing period to end before re-joining.
Just cancel your US account and wait till the closure date has lapsed. Then just log back into the account and hit restart membership and you will then see AU plan pricing and you are set. Then all you need to do it set up a smart DNS or set a VPN service DNS setting on a device you want to use for the US Netflix and you are all set.
Not really that hard to leave it active on the US billed service then cancel the account the day before you bill cycle ends though is it? Less than 24 hours without it? I’m sure even the most die hard couch potato can handle that.
I have a US Netflix account and i don’t think that i have ever needed to switch accounts to access other regions’ content. All you need to do is switch your IP to your desired country, say Australia, using a VPN. Now, when you sign in with your existing account, your library will automatically start displaying australian netflix content.. when you swith back to your original IP, you’ll get the content from your own location then..
I personally use PureVPN and its doing great for me when it comes to accessing content from all regions’ Netflix..
i dont know if this has been pointed out yet, but when the wii u version of netflix came out i was able to log into it with my USA account credentials and had access to the australian version. any device i log in to without unblock-us set up on it lets me use the australian version, and keeps anything ive saved to my list as well
It looks like I’m going to cancel my current US subscription as the price is going up to US$9.99 for the Standard Plan of 2 screens + HD. Up until now it was US$7.99
If I compare the US and AU services as of today (June 2016), it looks like the AU plans are now a cheaper option per month:
Standard Plan
AU Plan: AU$11.99 per month
Old US Plan: US$7.99 per month (approx AU$10.83)
New US Plan: US$9.99 per month (approx AU$13.54)