- Netflix provides an easy way to download video to your mobile device for times when you know you won’t have access to internet service.
- You can’t download video in a desktop web browser to a computer, or to a smart TV.
- When you no longer need your downloaded video, you can delete it through the Netflix app to save space on your phone or tablet.
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Netflix remains the most popular video streaming service, according to Adweek, and that’s not surprising; they’ve been in the video streaming business since 2007, and helped pioneer the streaming revolution.
But as convenient as streaming over the internet is, sometimes you’d prefer to download videos to watch without internet – if you’re planning to fly on a plane, visit a remote location, or otherwise be away from Wi-Fi service, you might want something saved to your phone or tablet for offline playback. Netflix makes it easy to download video to a mobile device for just these kinds of situations.
But while you can download Netflix content to a mobile device, that’s as far as you can go. Netflix does not offer any way to download videos in a web browser, so you can’t download onto your desktop computer or laptop. Nor can you download video to a smart TV.
How to download movies and show from Netflix on a mobile device
1. Open the Netflix app.
2. Find the movie or TV show you want to download and tap it to open its Details page.
3. Tap the Download button, which is shaped like a downward-pointing arrow. The button will change to indicate it's downloading, and after a few moments (depending on the speed of your Wi-Fi connection and the length of the video) it will be complete.
Movies only have a single download button, while a TV series will generally have separate download button for each episode. Also, note that not every video on Netflix can be downloaded - due to licensing issues, you may find that there's no download button available for a movie you want to save.
How to watch a movie you've downloaded on the Netflix app
Once you download a movie to your iPhone, iPad, or Android device, you don't need to do anything special to watch it. Just return to the movie or TV show you want to watch and tap it to play as usual.
You can tell it has been downloaded to your mobile device because you'll see a blue icon representing your mobile device instead of the Download button.
In addition, you can tap "Downloads" at the bottom of the screen to immediately see a list of all downloaded movies and TV shows stored on your mobile device.
How to delete a downloaded movie from Netflix to free space
After you've downloaded some movies to your mobile device, you may eventually want to remove them to save space. There are two ways to do this:
- To delete downloaded videos one at a time, go to the movie's Details page and tap the blue icon that tells you the video has been downloaded. In the pop-up menu that appears, tap "Delete Download."
- To delete all your downloaded videos at once, tap "More" at the bottom of the screen and then tap "App Settings." On the App Settings page, tap "Delete All Downloads."
