Netflix faced a wave of user complaints on Wednesday evening, right as anticipation peaked for the arrival of Stranger Things season five. DownDetector recorded a sharp rise in outage reports from around 7:40 p.m. Eastern, only twenty minutes before the first new episodes were scheduled to go live. The timing was enough to irritate fans who had blocked out their evening for the show’s return.
Social media filled up quickly with frustration. One X user captured the mood with a succinct plea: “Netflix fix your app bro.” Others reported frozen screens, error messages and failed playback attempts as they tried to load the service.
Netflix had earlier confirmed that the first four episodes of the new season would drop on Wednesday night. The streamer is spreading the release across the month to keep viewers engaged, with three more episodes set to arrive on December 25 and the finale due on December 31.
The company has not issued a comment on what triggered the disruption, although early signs point to a demand surge as millions flocked to the app at once. Stranger Things remains one of Netflix’s most powerful franchises, and its season premieres regularly draw some of the platform’s biggest traffic spikes.
Most users reported that the service stabilised not long after the initial dip, but the glitch was still an untimely distraction. With competition in streaming intensifying, Netflix is under pressure to deliver a seamless experience, especially around a flagship release. Even a short outage is enough to spark a wave of scrutiny when a show this popular is involved.
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