Online Movie Rental: Choosing the Best One

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Online movie rental is increasing in popularity, but it remains a short-term, imperfect solution. While we wait for technology to catch up with the optimistic promises that we were told years ago (that’s right, I’m referring to ubiquitous broadband and streaming movies), we’re sure to see an even greater demand for online DVD rentals.

If you’re one of the many people who are contemplating signing up with one of these rental services, here are a few characteristics that you might want to consider as you make your decision:

Shipping Facilities: so that your DVD’s arrive quickly, you will want to ensure that your movie service has a distribution center near you. This can make the difference between a one to two day turnaround, and a three to four day turnaround. This consistent turnaround time will become important to you as a user of the service so that you can plan your returns and rentals around typical viewing nights.
DVD Inventory: the number of titles available is a large consideration. Many movie watchers are primarily interested in current releases, but you might also want to consider what the inventory of TV series, classics, and movies from the past two decades is like You might even join the ranks of those who turned off cable entirely once they began using a rental service. Having regular access to series hits from HBO, Showtime, and network television is very attractive.
DVD Availability: A wide selection of movies is only one consideration — having enough copies of each title is also important. The number of copies of each movie will never be disclosed, but for the most part, the more popular the service, the deeper their inventory. In this area, Netflix is generally considered to outrank Blockbuster.
Plan Selection: each rental house should have a rental plan that satisfies your requirements, but some offer more flexibility than others. Examine your movie viewing habits and be sure your chosen rental house has a plan that fits.
Ease of Use: as you build your rental queue and look for movies to rent, you’ll start to appreciate more and more how easy a web site is to use. Looking at things like ease of navigation, how fast the site operates, accessibility of information where you need it, search facilities, etc. will have a big impact on your satisfaction with a service. I personally find this one of the top three factors for online DVD rental.
Reputation: you’re probably aware of the two largest players in online DVD rentals, and those are Blockbuster and Netflix. But what you might not know is that there are plenty of other niche providers like GreenCine for independent movies, DVD Empire, and other smaller providers. Unfortunately, many of these smaller services are smaller for a reason: they just don’t compare to the two big guns. To avoid any painful experiences, you should probably stick to the known entities.

When you campare all of the characteristics, there are really on two practical choices for a rental service, and those are Netflix and Blockbuster. To look at how each of these services up with each other, and to see which one’s best for you, check out this Netflix and Blockbuster comparison. It stacks the rental services up side-by-side, and can help you make a better decision.

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