Your Netflix recommendations are about to look very different — here’s why

Netflix might be your best friend and/or your significant other, but sometimes it might seem like it doesn’t know you well enough. Like yeah, sure, Netflix, maybe I did just binge all of The Office very quickly, but suggesting 35 other “work place comedies” isn’t what I’m in the mood for right now, you know? Besides, why does Netflix simply assume that if you watch one work place comedy, you want to watch them all?

Suggestions are yes, catered to you, but only to a certain degree. Netflix relies heavily on what you watch, what you’ve got in your queue, and also what others in your region are watching. If a lot of people in your area are watching Orange is The New Black, even if that’s not your style, it’s going to be suggested for you. If a lot of viewers in your region go from binging The Office to binging OITNB, that will be your first suggestion, because that model of suggestion has been their long-standing viewing algorithm.

But soon, that won’t be the case.

As Netflix gets bigger and BIGGER stateside and around the world, they’ve decided to change the way things are suggested for you. Now, it will be more catered to your specific taste, not so much by location. If you have the same viewing taste as someone in Sweden, or Brazil, or Canada, you’re going to see their suggestions, and vice-versa. Netflix suggestions are about to go world-wide.

“Simply put, tapping into global insights makes our personalized recommendations even better because now our members benefit from like-minded viewers no matter where they are in the world,” Carlos Gomez-Uribe, Netflix’s vice president of personalization algorithms, explained in a press release. Also, how do we get that job?

“While this is especially helpful if a member is in a new or smaller market, we’re also able to better serve members in larger, more established markets who have highly specific or niche tastes,” Gomez-Uribe continued.

This is all good stuff. This means that soon, you’ll be able to get better (and more accurate) catered suggestions for you, based on how many of those work place comedies you stream, no matter where you are in the world. Thanks for always looking out for our best binging, Netflix.