FreeveeCopied

Amazon announced on 13 April 2022 that IMDb TV, its free, ad supported streaming service, would become Amazon Freevee on 27 April. CNBC reported that the company said the new name better reflects the free nature of the service. The service had launched in 2019 as IMDb Freedive before becoming IMDb TV, so this was its third name in roughly three years.

The explanation in Amazon's release, quoted by The Verge, came from director Ashraf Alkarmi. Customers were increasingly shifting to ad supported premium content, he said, and Freevee was built to deliver sought after shows with half the commercials of traditional TV. The new name, in his words, clearly communicates what the service is: easy to navigate and free, whenever and wherever people choose to watch.

The business context explains why Amazon bothered. CNBC described the ad supported video market as having caught fire during the pandemic, with rivals such as Pluto TV, Tubi, Crackle and the Roku Channel, while Amazon also sold Prime Video on subscription. Amazon said the service had tripled its monthly active users over two years, and Amazon Studios head Jennifer Salke said the company wanted to establish Freevee as the premier service of its kind with a growing slate of originals. The Verge noted a plan to grow original programming by 70 per cent by the end of the year, anchored by shows such as Bosch: Legacy.

The Verge was sceptical, observing that the earlier rebrand never put the platform on the map and that, at this stage of the streaming wars, a wealth of content does not guarantee an audience; it allowed that the third time might be the charm.

Separating the service from IMDb was overdue; a film database is not a television brand, and the old name confused the two. Freevee does say free, which is the only feature that matters in this category. But it is a forced coinage that sounds like a promo code, and attaching Amazon to the front ties it to Prime Video in a way that blurs which service offers what. A name designed to explain a product is useful; one this literal rarely builds loyalty.