Picture Credit: Netflix
If you were streaming on a PlayStation 3 back in 2013, you might remember an incredibly quirky feature popping up on your screen. Over the years, Netflix has experimented with a much more interactive approach to solving choice paralysis and while AI search is currently in testing, we wanted to revisit a feature that’s over 10 years old and didn’t last forever, but helped you decide what to watch next.
They called it Max. No, not HBO Max, just Max, presumably to help you get the MAXimum out of Netflix.
Part virtual assistant, part game-show host, Max was an attempt to make deciding what to watch feel like less of a chore and more of an event. Let’s take a trip down memory lane and look at one of Netflix’s strangest and, sadly, short-lived experiments.
According to one write-up, it was developed by Jackbox Games, a games studio that recently teamed up with Netflix Games division to bring a special collection of their Jackbox Party games to the streamer.
When Did Max Launch?
Max officially rolled out on June 28, 2013. At the time, it was exclusive to the PlayStation 3 app — which made sense, as the PS3 was the most popular Netflix streaming device in the world back then, though it was among the numerous devices that got discontinued with the most recent Netflix UI overhaul.
The idea was to test it on the PS3 first, with the promise that if it performed well, Netflix would expand Max to other devices like the iPad. (Spoiler alert: That didn’t quite pan out.) “If Max performs at the level he promises, we’ll expand his repertoire and make him available on other devices in the future, likely the iPad next,” Todd Yellin, VP of product innovation at Netflix (who was with the company through December 2022), wrote in a blog post announcing the feature, which is no longer online.
What Did Max Actually Do?
Max was essentially a comedic recommendation engine designed to gamify finding what to watch next. If you didn’t know what you wanted to watch, Max would swoop in with some quirky dialogue and guide you through a few mini-games to figure out your mood.
If you remember the irreverent trivia game series You Don’t Know Jack, Max’s vibe will sound incredibly familiar — and for good reason. Netflix actually partnered with Jellyvision (the creators of You Don’t Know Jack) to build the interface.
When you engaged with Max, he would offer you a few different ways to find a show or movie:
- The Rating Game: Max would show you a few titles and ask you to rate them on a 5-star scale. Based on your ratings, he would calculate a personalized suggestion.
- The Celebrity Mood Ring: Max would show you two actors (e.g., Bruce Willis and Michelle Williams) and ask who you’d rather watch. He would then suggest a title featuring the actor you chose.
- The “Either/Or” Genre Pick: You’d be asked to choose between two comically specific, polar-opposite genres — like “Talking Animals” or “Tortured Genius.”
- Max’s Mystery Call: If you were feeling completely indecisive (or adventurous), you could just let Max pick something blindly for you. A digital gift box would appear on screen, and whatever was inside would immediately start playing.
If Max gave you a suggestion, you could ask him for a quick “30-second pitch” where he would playfully explain why you should watch it before you hit play.
Celebrity Mood Ring on Max – Ironically, if you selected either of these as of right now, they’d return zero results
A video explaining the feature, presented by then Pedro Freitas, Senior Manager of Product Innovation (who we found an inactive Twitter account for but couldn’t find out if he’s still working at Netflix), diving into the feature, and boy, is it a blast to the past. Many of the features, and even the titles, presented in the UI are long gone. This was back when Netflix let you rate things out of five rather than the thumbs-up, double-thumbs-up, and down we have now.
This was back when Disney titles were streaming, so you could watch The Avengers, Brother Bear 2, and Cars. You can also see a Popular on Facebook row from when Netflix (and most apps back then) encouraged you to link to your Facebook so you could share with your friends, and even had your avatar as your Facebook profile picture.
Why Was Max Discontinued?
Despite being a fun, novel idea, Max just didn’t catch on with the wider subscriber base. It required too much active participation when most people just wanted to hit a button and zone out.
Plus, as one user pointed out on Reddit years later, the feature had its flaws. If you used Max multiple times, you’d often end up seeing the same small pool of movies and shows. It felt a bit rigid compared to the seamless, data-driven recommendation algorithms Netflix was perfecting behind the scenes.
By May 2015, users started noticing that Max had quietly vanished from their PS3 apps. Netflix customer service reps at the time confirmed that the feature was officially retired because it simply never gained the traction executives had hoped for.
The Legacy of Max
While Max is long gone, the problem he/it was trying to solve — the endless scrolling and choice paralysis — is something Netflix has continued to tackle.
Max’s spiritual successors can be seen in features like the short-lived “Surprise Me” (or Play Something) shuffle button, which Netflix introduced in 2021 and quietly discontinued in early 2023. The latest iteration to help you is their vertical video feed, which shows you a preview of popular clips from various Netflix shows or movies in the hope you jump over.
Do you remember Max? Do you wish Netflix would bring it back somehow? Let us know in the comments down below.
