How much time do you spend browsing streaming services in search of content per year? The average American, apparently, spends about 110 hours per year doing that.
Five days per year to decide what to watch? Browsing streaming services can be a frustrating experience for a number of reasons. From bad design and distractions to duplicate listings and categorization that does not make much sense.
If you now thought the answer would be improving the design of the apps and website, you are sadly mistaken. Disney+ just launched Verts in the United States. It is a short-format vertical video feed designed for the TikTok and Tinder-age.
Watch a quick click and swipe to either dismiss the content, start watching right away, or add it to the list of favorites. Repeat the swiping until you found something to watch.
Instead of browsing a never-ending stream of TV show and movie thumbnails, Disney+ users may now use that format to find something to watch.
Disney writes:
With a tap of the new Verts icon in the navigation bar on mobile, users enter a vertical video feed and can swipe through a stream of scenes and moments from movies and shows on Disney+, and seamlessly add to their Watchlist or jump directly into playback.
This, according to Disney, is making it easier for subscribers to find new content to watch and explore the catalog of shows and movies in a different, modern, way.
Instead of browsing the endless stream of thumbnails, subscribers may now browse a never-ending stream of short clips instead. Whether that is really going to reduce the hours per year spend browsing catalogs remains to be seen. Might do it for the TikTok-generation more than any other. Probably only a matter of time before other content, including ads, are appearing in the feed as well.
No word on a rollout in other regions yet.