Cancelling Netflix
TL;DR: Netflix underinvests in Canada despite receiving ~$1.7 billion from Canadians in 2024
- Cancelled my Netflix subscription after 10 years—found Netflix underinvests in Canada despite receiving ~$1.7 billion/year from Canadian subscribers (~4-5% of revenue).
- Netflix's presence in Canada is minimal: Only ~2% of employees and just 3.6% of Netflix original feature films in 2024 were filmed here (USA dominates, followed by Spain, UK, and India).
- Crave (21) and CBC (25) each filmed far more TV series in Canada in 2024 than Netflix (9).
- If just half of Canadian Netflix subscribers switched to Crave/CBC, these Canadian platforms could increase their investment in Canadian productions, likely more than making up for the potential loss of Netflix's investment in the Canadian film industry.
Reviewing My Bank Statements
Finding the Netflix payments in my credit card transaction history was easy (unlike Apple TV+, which were hidden among various other APPLE.COM/BILL charges, but that's a different story). The two most recent Netflix payments were for $8.95 because I downgraded my Netflix to the Standard Plan with Ads near the beginning of the U.S.-Canada trade war. Prior to downgrading, I was paying $18.47 per month (as shown in my RBC online banking transactions below).
Banking Transactions Screenshot
The image shows recent Netflix charges in my RBC online banking.
In total, I've paid CA$1021.15 to Netflix over the past 5 years, and CA$1753.53 over the past 10 years.
Learning About Netflix
I already knew that Netflix was an American company. However, I was curious to learn how many Canadians they employed. Below is Netflix's company profile:
Netflix
Company Headquarters
Los Gatos, California, United States
Canadian Attributes
We can see above that Netflix has a limited number of employees in Canada, but I wanted to take a closer look. Below is the Netflix employee distribution by location according to LinkedIn:
Source: LinkedIn
Out of the 17,082 associated members of Netflix (as of May 27, 2025), at least 61% are based in the United States, at least 7% are based in the United Kingdom, and at least 3% are based in the Netherlands. Canada does not make the list of the top 15 locations. Searching for Netflix employees based in Canada found roughly 346 people, which is about 2% of the 17,082 total Netflix employees on LinkedIn.
It's estimated that the United Kingdom accounts for roughly 6-7% of Netflix's revenue, whereas Canada accounts for roughly 4-5% of Netflix's revenue. So to see how few Netflix employees are based in Canada, relative to Canada's contribution to Netflix's revenue, is quite disappointing.
Another way to assess Netflix's investment in Canada is to look at where they film their original content. Here's where all Netflix Originals (feature films) released in 2024 were filmed:
Source: Film locations from IMDb, compiled May 2025. Films may have multiple filming locations.
As we can see from the chart, despite Canada contributing around 4-5% of Netflix's revenue, only 3.6% of their original films released in 2024 (5 out of 137) were filmed in Canada. The United States dominates as the top filming location for Netflix content, with 33 films (24.1%), followed by Spain, the United Kingdom, and India. While Canada does appear in the top 15 countries, we're significantly behind other markets that represent similar revenue contributions to Netflix.
Based on this one perspective (Netflix Originals feature films), it would appear that Netflix is underinvesting in “Hollywood North.” So let's look at some Canadian alternatives to Netflix.
Researching Canadian Alternatives
I knew that Crave was Canadian (owned by Bell Media), but wanted to do a broad search to see if there was anything else. So I typed, “I want to cancel Netflix,” into USAboycott.ca's search engine, and got the following results:
USAboycott.ca Search Results
This reminded me that CBC Gem has a streaming service that includes TV shows and movies, not just the news. I was also pleasantly surprised to learn about the U.K.-based options BritBox and MUBI.
TV Series Filming Locations
Although I was ready to cancel my Netflix subscription, I was curious to see how many Netflix Originals TV Series were filmed in Canada (relative to Crave Originals and CBC-made shows). Growing up in Vancouver, I know how many TV shows are filmed here, so I wondered whether Netflix makes up for their underinvestment in producing feature films in Canada by filming lots of TV shows here. After hours of scouring the web (especially IMDb), here's what I found:
Sources: IMDb, Netflix, Crave, CBC Gem, Netflix's official netflixinyourneighbourhood.ca website. Includes all Netflix Originals, Crave Originals, and CBC-made shows with a season released in 2024. Compiled May 2025.
To my surprise, Crave actually filmed the most TV Series in Canada (that were released in 2024). Roughly one third of these are thanks to Crave's “Made in Quebec” content.
Perhaps not surprisingly, CBC filmed more than a dozen TV Series in Canada (released in 2024).
Netflix did film several TV Series (with a season released in 2024) in Canada—9 in total—but far fewer than Crave at 21, and CBC at 25. I might have been okay with this, if it weren't for the graph below.
Canadians Spend on Streaming
Source: Estimated based on company earnings reports and market research as of May 2025.
In 2024, Canadians paid roughly $1.6-1.8 billion per year for Netflix (~8.5 million subscribers), $400-600 million per year for Crave (3.6 million subscribers), and $30-60 million per year for CBC Gem (less than 1 million subscribers). Yet CBC filmed roughly twice as many TV shows in Canada as Netflix did in 2024, while Crave filmed nearly three times as many.
A Thought Experiment
If half of Canadian Netflix subscribers cancelled their Netflix subscription (let's say 4 million subscribers), then 3 million of those Canadians subscribed to Crave, while 1 million subscribed to CBC Gem, that would double each Canadian streaming service's subscriber base (and thus revenue). Taking the thought experiment further, if Netflix were to cancel all of their Canadian productions (9 TV shows released in 2024), then Crave and CBC would only have to increase their filmed in Canada productions by 20% each to make up for the loss of Netflix's investment in the Canadian film industry. That is, Crave would have to produce 4 more TV series in Canada (increasing their annual total from 21 to 25), while CBC would have to increase their filmed in Canada productions by 5 (increasing their annual total from 25 to 30).
I would argue that these assumptions are conservative. I doubt that Netflix would cancel all of their Canadian productions if half of their Canadian subscribers cancelled. And on the flip side, I doubt that Crave and CBC would only increase their filmed in Canada productions by 20% if each of their revenues doubled.
Boycotting Netflix
So after being a Netflix subscriber for 10 straight years, I decided to pull the trigger and cancel my subscription.
Why did I cancel my Netflix subscription?
I tell every U.S. company I boycott that, “I'm boycotting U.S. products and services until the U.S. government reinstates free and fair trade in North America and stops threatening to annex Canada.” My hope is that when enough Canadians send this message, CEOs of U.S. companies will relay this message to their elected representatives (or to Trump himself). But in the case of Netflix, I was also underwhelmed by how little they invest in Canadians and the Canadian film industry, given how much Canadians spend on Netflix.
That's why I cancelled Netflix... how about you?
#ElbowsUp