Netflix is finally moving away from Microsoft's Silverlight for video streaming on the Mac, at least for OS X Yosemite users. The company said it is instead relying on a feature called Media Source Extensions which will give subscribers 1080p quality video without taxing your Mac's CPU or battery.
OS X Yosemite lets Netflix ditch Microsoft's Silverlight
Currently, Netflix streaming on the Mac requires Silverlight, which is a multimedia playback and streaming extension from Microsoft. It's proprietary, much like Adobe's Flash, and requires users to install extra software on their Mac. In OS X Yosemite, however, no extra software is needed because all the pieces are already in place to support HTML5 video.
"We've been working closely with Apple to implement the Premium Video Extensions in Safari, which allow playback of premium video content in the browser without the use of plugins," Netflix said in a statement.
Apple introduced OS X Yosemite earlier this week at its annual Worldwide Developer Conference keynote presentation. The new version of the Mac operating system will be available this fall with a flatter looking interface, tighter integration with iOS for document sharing, more powerful Spotlight searching, document markup support in Mail, the ability to start an email message on your Mac, iPhone or iPad, and finish it on another device, and more.
OS X Yosemite won't officially ship until this fall, but a public beta is coming soon. Netflix said its Silverlight-free streaming will be available to anyone using Safari in the beta release.