According to a Bloomberg report, the streaming giant experienced its worst two weeks of streaming in April, with audience measurement site Nielsen recording that Netflix didn’t have a single original series in the top 10 for the week of April 13 to April 19. Its highest ranked title for that week, which came in at number 8, was Grey’s Anatomy – older episodes that are also available on rival streamer Hulu. Data shows that this is the worst showing for Netflix since Nielsen started doing
its weekly rankings for the platform in 2017. Likewise, the streamer performed woefully the week prior to April 13. According to Nielsen, this is just the fifth time Netflix didn’t land an original series in the overall top 10. “Netflix is constitutionally incapable of producing good original content,” one critic tweeted on X in response to the Bloomberg report. “They are slaves to chasing audience data and ruined their programming as a result.” Another critic chimed in: “Yeah I can see why, Netflix this year
is one of worst Netflix years ever, but it’s bad just on the new shows side only, I’m even looking on what coming a head of the rest of the year, only 2-3 interesting new shows (East of Eden, Human Vapor, Little House on the Prairie) and these show not big as what their rivals have.” It didn’t help that during this two-week period, the only Netflix original series released was Beef Season 2, which debuted on April 16 but only managed to reach the
top 3 with 4.1 million views after a full week on the streamer (from April 20 to 26). Beef Season 2 launched to just over 2 million views in its first four days of release, which is almost a 60 per cent drop from Season 1’s premiere weekend. Season 2 of the anthology series stars Carey Mulligan and Oscar Isaac as a couple who run a California country club that get blackmailed by two junior workers, triggering an all-out toxic war. But, it appears Netflix’s
bad run did not extend into the month of May. Its TV adaptation of Man on Fire has become a solid hit. The high-action thriller premiered on April 30 and racked up 11 million views in its first four days alone. It clocked up an additional 12.6 million views during its first full week. The series – adapted from the 2004 Denzel Washington film of the same name – stars Yahya Abdul-Mateen II in the lead role as a Special Forces veteran seeking redemption and
protecting a teenage girl in Rio de Janeiro.
Netflix, Nielsen weekly rankings, Grey’s Anatomy, Hulu, Beef Season 2, Carey Mulligan, Oscar Isaac, Man on Fire, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Rio de Janeiro, streaming performance, April 2026