Netflix knows you’re looking at your phone—and it’s changing how shows get made because of it

Watching TV no longer just means watching TV. After the rise of tablets and smartphones in the late aughts, a second-screen experience became the new standard for home viewing. Live-blogging the latest season of Netflix’s Stranger Things, or buying a new T-shirt during it, is now just reflexive for millions of people. According to a 2023 YouGov study, 91% of Americans at least sometimes look at their phones while watching TV. For generations weaned on TikTok, that “sometimes” might be a little closer to “always.” As Saturday Night Live’s Michael Longfellow recently joked about the app’s brief ban: “What do I even watch during a movie now?”

Although viewing habits have long been headed in this direction, what’s changed more recently is that Netflix now appears to have adapted to those habits by optimizing for second-screen viewing.

A December deep dive into Netflix’s approach, from literary culture magazine n+1, describes how the streaming service has subtly changed the way some of its movies and shows get made. As Will Tavlin writes, “Several screenwriters who’ve worked for the streamer told me a common note from company executives is ‘have this character announce what they’re doing so that viewers who have this program on in the background can follow along.’” (Netflix did not respond to Fast Company’s request for comment.)

Tavlin goes on to include a dialogue exchange from last year’s Lindsay Lohan-comeback vehicle, Irish Wish, that sounds like an audio commentary track describing what has previously happened. (“I admit it was a beautiful day filled with dramatic vistas and romantic rain,” Lohan’s character says at one point, “but that doesn’t give you the right to question my life choices. Tomorrow, I’m marrying Paul Kennedy.”)

Overly expository dialogue is nothing new. It’s usually just a sign of lazy writing. If it’s no longer just a trope but rather part of a studio-wide effort to relieve viewers of having to come up for air from their phones once in a while, well, that feels like a different story.

The n+1 report isn’t the only suggestion that streaming services like Netflix are now making content with an eye toward background viewing. Actor and director Justine Bateman made headlines in 2023 when she told The Hollywood Reporter, “I’ve heard from showrunners who are given notes from the streamers that ‘this isn’t second screen enough.’” More recently, U.K. outlet The Telegraph singled out a conversation on BBC’s Miss Me podcast, between Stranger Things actor David Harbour and host Miquita Oliver, about the process of “second-screen pitching.” During it, Oliver mentioned that studios are “asking for ideas that people will kind of ignore, so they can be on their phone.”

Netflix seems especially receptive to such ideas. In 2020, New Yorker writer Kyle Chayka coined the term “ambient TV” to describe Netflix programming like the breezy sitcom Emily in Paris and the reality series Dream Home Makeover—shows that are pleasant enough but require zero engagement from viewers. “[A]s prestige passes its peak,” Chayka wrote, “we’re moving into the ambient era, which succumbs to, rather than competes with, your phone.”

At the time, the growing abundance of this kind of content could have been written off as a coincidence. If a streaming service is meant to be all things to all people, of course some areas of its programming would have a similarly smooth-brain feel. These recent reports all but confirm, however, that the company is actively making its content more palatable for background viewing.

There is nothing inherently wrong with providing ambient TV for those who just want to zone out while thumbing through TikTok (while we still have it . . . ). Considering how many prestige shows still aspire to be taken seriously as high art, it’s refreshing to see shows with the courage to be trashy fun to have on in the background while doing house chores or decompressing after a long day. Netflix was making the latter kind of show for years before The New Yorker gave it a genre name. It certainly hasn’t hurt Netflix’s bottom line, either—the company just posted a Q4 revenue increase of 16% from a year earlier, helped along by another 19 million subscribers for the quarter.

Clearly, Netflix seems to be delivering what people want from it.

The question remains, though, whether the company is only contorting some of its original content to be better background viewing, or if that aesthetic is becoming its feature attraction.