EU Portability Regulation

Explanation

The EU Portability Regulation (EU Regulation 2017/1128) came into force in April 2018 and requires streaming services operating in the European Union to provide subscribers with access to their home-country content library when they are temporarily in another EU member state. Before the regulation, a Netflix UK subscriber traveling to France would see the French Netflix catalog instead of the UK one, losing access to UK-exclusive titles. Under portability rules, the service must treat the traveler as if they were still at home — verifying their home country through payment method or billing address, then serving the home catalog. The regulation applies to paid SVOD services and does not extend to free tiers. It covers content the service holds rights to in the home country; EU studios and rights holders are required to grant portability permissions when licenses are renewed.