Max’s new homepage personalization tech makes viewers stick around, says exec

If you’ve been on Max lately, you might’ve noticed more personalized rows of content across your entire homepage. That’s because the streaming service formerly known as HBO Max rolled out a new “whole page optimization” system in the US last month to get viewers to keep coming back — and Warner Bros. Discovery says it’s working.

Liesel Kipp, Warner Bros. Discovery’s senior vice president of global streaming product, tells The Verge that the company has seen a “meaningful lift” in how long viewers watch content on Max, how many times they come back, and the types of shows people end up watching. “The system can really help consumers find those hidden gems on Max,” Kipp says.

Similar to other content algorithms, like the one used by Netflix, Max’s new system uses your viewing history and patterns to figure out which shows or movies you like best. It then uses that information to serve content in personalized categories.

As an example, you may see a collection titled “heart-pounding thrills” toward the top of your page if you’re into thrillers or another titled “supernatural scares” if you like horror. Previously, Kipps says Max used a combination of human curation and personalization, but it was only limited to individual rows of content. The new system changes the look of your whole homepage to match your taste.

At the same time, Max will ensure you don’t see repeat titles on your homepage while making content it thinks you’re not interested in less visible. “We’re going to refine and make sure those collections and those rails that are most relevant to you are the things that bubble up,” Kipp says. “We’ll always balance that with what’s really important on the platform.” That means Max will still prominently display some of its most popular titles, like House of the Dragon, even if you’re not into them.

Max has other plans for content personalization down the line as well. That includes a Netflix-esque rating system the service is testing that will let you rank titles as “love,” “like,” or “not for me.” Max is also experimenting with using AI to pick up on social and emotional context within titles to apply to recommendations.

With so many streaming choices out there now, it’s become even more important for streamers to get subscribers to stick around. After all, Netflix’s content recommendation system is one of the reasons why it has ballooned to nearly 270 million global subscribers. Other services, like Disney Plus, have reportedly considered implementing a similar system.