The NFL’s Christmas Day Netflix debut went smoothly

The NFL’s Christmas Day Netflix debut went smoothly

Netflix’s NFL debut launched without a hitch on Christmas Day.

Mariah Carey opened Wednesday’s doubleheader with a taped performance of “All I Want for Christmas is You” before Patrick Mahomes, Travis Kelce and the two-time defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City Chiefs took on Russell Wilson, TJ Watt and the Pittsburgh Steelers .

The Houston Texans host the Baltimore Ravens in game two, while the NFL features four of the AFC’s top five teams.

Netflix agreed to a three-year deal to broadcast Christmas games in May. The streaming giant is expecting one of its biggest days since the site launched in 1998.

Netflix’s 282.3 million subscribers in more than 190 countries can stream the games. This is the first time a network will distribute an NFL game worldwide. Netflix offers the games in five languages ​​– English, French, Spanish, Portuguese and German.

Netflix had problems streaming the fight between Mike Tyson and Jake Paul on November 14th. The fight peaked at 65 million concurrent streams, including 38 million concurrent streams in the United States. According to the website Down Detector, nearly 85,000 viewers reported issues with outages or streaming leading up to and during the fight.

There were no signs of problems early Wednesday. The biggest test may come at halftime of the Ravens-Texans game, when Beyoncé performs live at NRG Stadium.

According to NFL Media, viewers in all 50 states tuned in within minutes of the pregame show going live, and viewers from nearly 200 countries watched the introduction until kickoff.

The NFL plays its first games on Wednesday since the Steelers and Ravens were forced to play on December 2, 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The only time the league played on a Wednesday since 1948 was in 2012, when the Giants and Cowboys met in the season opener.

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AP NFL: https://apnews.com/hub/NFL

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