Bigflix Gets a Facelift, Now Starts at Rs. 50 per Month

Reliance Entertainment, the Anil Ambani-owned firm, has given a facelift to its subscription-based movie streaming service, Bigflix. The new version will be available in India and across the world at Rs. 50 / $1.99 per month, after a one-month free trial. The plan offers five user profiles, and HD quality streaming on up to five devices simultaneously.

Bigflix's revamped version is meant to complete in India's increasingly crowded yet nascent market, which includes the likes of Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, and Hotstar, among others. At the same time, Reliance also wants to cater to "the latent demand of the Indian expatriates" world over.

In a statement, Reliance Entertainment's COO Shibasish Sarkar said: "Indians are moving to digital entertainment in a big way with consumption growing on a daily basis. Notably, Bigflix will fill in the void created by the decline of the home video market by digitally delivering movies."

The new Bigflix has over 2,000 titles across nine languages, including Hindi, Telugu, Tamil, Punjabi, Malayalam, Gujarati, Marathi, Bhojpuri, and Bengali. It has tied up with the likes of Dharma, Disney, Viacom, Phantom, Telegu One and Rajshri.

Some of the featured movies on Bigflix are PK, Wazir, Madaari, Kai Po Che, Phantom, Mohenjo Daro, Paan Singh Tomar, Baaghi, Holiday, Raghav 2.0, Haider, Dev.D, and Fitoor. Though it shares part of its name with Netflix, Bigflix is only focused on films - feature, short and devotional - and trailers.

Its India-centric content approach puts it squarely against the likes of Prime Video, whose focus at launch was to serve the country's big regional interests. But unlike Amazon, Reliance doesn't want to focus on its English-language catalogue, which will be limited in size.

In terms of pricing, Bigflix is more expensive than its Amazon rival - Rs. 600 for a year vs Rs. 499 per year. It's still cheaper than other competitors; Hotstar costs Rs. 199 per month, and Eros Now offers HD content at Rs. 99 per month. For what it's worth, Hotstar has a much wider portfolio - with tie-ups with HBO, and rights for the likes of IPL, Premier League, and Wimbledon.

Bigflix already has 3.9 million users, claims Reliance. That's because Reliance was the first-ever video-on-demand platform in India, back in 2008. But a lack of Internet infrastructure prevented it from ever growing in size. Now that the likes of Netflix, Amazon and Star have proven that there's a market - even Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Jio got into the game with JioCinema - Reliance Entertainment has seen fit to re-launch Bigflix.

You can download or stream movies on Bigflix from your Android and iOS devices, smart TVs, PCs, and game consoles.