Netflix ad-supported tier has 40 million monthly users, nearly double previous count

Netflix's cheaper, ad-supported tier has amassed 40 million global monthly active users, the company said Wednesday.

That's nearly double the 23 million figure the streaming giant shared in January.

Separately, Netflix announced it would launch its own advertising platform and no longer partner with Microsoft for that technology. The tech giant will remain a programmatic advertising partner.

Netflix introduced the ad-supported plan in November 2022 as part of a wider effort to drive revenue amid slowing subscriber growth. That strategy included last year's password-sharing crackdown.

The company said Wednesday that 40% of all signups in countries that have the ad tier available are for that cheaper plan. Netflix now has 270 million total subscribers.

The monthly active ad-tier user figures come just a month after Netflix told investors it would no longer be providing quarterly subscriber number updates. The company said at the time that it was generating substantial profit and free cash flow and that its membership numbers were not the only factor in the company's growth. It said the metric lost significance after it started to offer multiple price points for memberships.

The surge in ad-tier users comes as linear TV audiences shrink and traditional media companies seek to gain a foothold in the streaming realm. Netflix has established itself as the leader in the segment as many other companies struggle to make their streaming platforms profitable.

Key competitors have far fewer subscribers than Netflix does. In its first-quarter earnings report, Comcast said its streaming platform Peacock had 34 million subscribers.

This is a breaking news story. Please check back for updates.

Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal and CNBC.