- Max added more than 120 new features to its app in 2024
- A WBD study indicates an increase in design, stability and personalization
- The service has been rolled out to 73 new countries in the last nine months
Max has been busy making a lot of updates for his app in the last year as part of its global expansion to several countries, but not every new feature is welcome.
Of the 120 new features that were added to the Max app in 2024, most are aimed at improving the content discovery journey to find the best max movies and best max shows, but there have also been some less favorable ad-related updates.
These include ads that let you shop for products related to the content you see by clicking on a QR code, sponsored content recommendations and advertisements targeting ‘moments’ (not being confused with Netflix ‘moments’ feature that makes content sharing).
It is an area that many of the best streaming services are increasingly doubling when they look for more ways to generate lost revenue from failed movies and shows. In fact, Prime Video has also added a lot of the same ad functions in the past year, making it slowly filled with even more ads.
Apart from the ad task, Warner Bros. Discovery made other changes to the Max app, including improvements as an improved navigation design on the website to make your streaming life easier.
This update moved the navigation tools, usually found at the top of a title for the menu on the left, making it much easier to find these settings (see the difference made in the photo below).
Global subscribers have also been treated in several ways to find content in the app even while in the middle of streaming. This feature allows you to browse similar titles while watching a movie or view by clicking a roller line to access the recommendation list.
Like Netflix, Max has also added similar functionality to recommend more movies and shows to watch after you finish streaming a title. This means that after 25 seconds, if you haven’t chosen anything else, a related genrel title will automatically start playing.
Another Netflix feature that Max has added is that titles on the website automatically start playing the trailer with audio while you are reviewing. I don’t know about you, but I can’t help but find this distracting while reviewing by content and would rather the sound be muted while the video is played. At least this feature has only been rolled out to the United States for now.
Other only American features added include the possibility of seeing five of HBO’s linear channels through the app. These include HBO, HBO 2, HBO Signature, HBO comedy and HBO zone.
And of course, we can’t forget the new multiView feature for the 2025’s NASCAR CUP series that puts you in the driver’s seat that was added to US subscribers’ apps earlier this year. It’s a great sports feature we see that they are added to many streamers, such as the Apple TV app and YouTube.
This is just a small part of the technical updates added to Max’s streaming app since September 2024, but they highlight a lot of the behind the scenes that the service performs as it appears to expand to more regions.
Max has been rolled out to 73 new countries over the course of nine months and will soon launch at Aussie Shores on March 31, just in time for HBOs The last of us Season 2, which premieres on April 13. However, for those of us in the UK, we will be patient to wait a little longer until we can access all these amazing features in Max (probably the beginning of 2026 that goes by reports). Meanwhile, the best place to stream HBO content in the US in the sky or now.
