Netflix releases Android app

Netflix announced today that it has released its official Android OS application into the Market today (Android Market link). The app is free to download and will only be available on the following devices (at least to begin with):

• HTC Incredible with Android 2.2
• HTC Nexus One with Android 2.2 or 2.3
• HTC EVO 4G with Android 2.2
• HTC G2 with Android 2.2
• Samsung Nexus S with Android 2.3

Netflix hopes to add more supported devices in the future, as it works with partners.

Netflix stated:

The Android platform is gaining rapid adoption in the mobile world and presents a great opportunity to reach more of our members. Because the platform has evolved so rapidly, there are some significant challenges associated with developing a streaming video application for this ecosystem. One of these challenges is the lack of standard streaming playback features that the Netflix application can use to gain broad penetration across all available Android phones. In the absence of standardization, we have to test each individual handset and launch only on those that can support playback. We are aggressively qualifying phones and look forward to expanding the list of phones on which the Netflix app will be supported. We anticipate that many of these technical challenges will be resolved in the coming months and that we will be able to provide a Netflix application that will work on a large majority of Android phones.

Are you going to download this?