LoveFilm DVD Rental Review

Review of LoveFilm DVD Rental

STOP PRESS! LoveFilm is now offering a 30 day free trial on any subscription plan - plus a £5 e-voucher to spend at the LoveFilm shop (selling DVDs, Blu-ray, Games).

WITH Lovefilm DVD rental's claim that they have 'virtually every DVD in the UK' and with over 65,000 movie titles (note, that includes bonus discs) on their virtual shelves, there are few other online DVD rental sites that even come close. Perhaps only Blockbuster can claim to compete on that front.

We've tried hard over the years to catch Lovefilm out, punching in the most obscure world cinema titles we could find and, almost flabbergastingly, Lovefilm has the blinking title in its catalogue!

What's more, if for some reason you manage to find some long forgotten UK-released DVD that miraculously isnt in the Lovefilm collection, they'll not only source it for you in days, they say they'll send it to you first!

We've long wanted to test this claim out, but have yet to find a title that Lovefilm didn't stock.

One of the best online DVD rental providers

Despite being a monolith that has raised the heckles of more than a few disgruntled customers, LoveFilm remains at the top end of the UK DVD rental market, especially when it comes to innovation.

For example, Lovefilm now allows their zillions of subscribers to create and publicly share their own 'collections'. It's a brilliantly simple, but hugely useful feature when you are stuck for inspiration. We especially love the official selections of certain celebrities including Matt Damon and Bill Nighy. In fact as Lovefilm becomes more and more powerful, it seems that their celebrity endorsements become ever more impressive. While this is no criteria on which to judge the service, we can't help but be slightly impressed.

More importantly though, we're also thrilled to see that Lovefilm has listened to its customers and now offer a Pay As You Go rental service too where, instead of unlimited rentals, you simply pay for each DVD you rent. Read our full review of the Lovefilm Pay As You Go DVD rental service.

Not everyone loves Lovefilm

While we maintain that LoveFilm has few online DVD rental services that rival it, it is not without fault.

Some users report a slow turnaround and others are disgruntled with the way they have been treated by Lovefilm's customer services. Keep in mind though that with more customers than any other service, there are naturally going to be more complaints. Our experience with LoveFilm has always been positive.

In terms of turn-around, our multiple tests of the service over the years has always been extremely impressed with the fast turnaround of titles. What has got us down most has been the availability of top titles, which - like with all other DVD rental services - remains the achilles heel of the whole business model.

Fair use 'throttling'

Heavier users should be aware that LoveFilm operates a fair use policy where the heaviest of renters will lose priority to popular titles during periods of high demand. There does seem to be a rather hazy interpretation of what a heavy user is and even some moderate users claim to have fallen foul of the policy.

As we said, the other thing Lovefilm tends to fall down on at times is their availability of top choices in your rental queue.

In this instance, Lovefilm are a victim of their own success - with almost a million subscribers, the mind just boggles at how many copies of popular titles they'd need to stock in order to fulfill everyone's wishlist in order. Having said that, most of Lovefilm's rival DVD rental firms suffer the same problem. If you want your first choice of movie at exactly the time you want to watch it, you'd be better off with Sky, Virgin Media, Tiscali TV who all offer on-demand movies, or plump for Lovefilm's slightly pricier downloadable movies (more about that below).

Now offering games rentals too

LoveFilm now offers game rentals for a range of consoles including the big 5: PS2, XBox 360, PS3, PSP, Wii and just recently DS too, however they don't offer as many titles as the more dedicated games rental services. This is fast changing though as Lovefilm continues to push its games rentals heavily.

We suspect there are some sweaty palms over at the dedicated games rental services, but the fact that there are still a handful of dedicated online games rental sites who are clearly doing very well and growing steadily suggests that despite Lovefilm's no-doubt comparitively collossal budget for promoting its games rental packages, winning over the tech-savvy and anarchic customer group of core gamers is going to be an uphill battle.

Customers can choose from 4 packages that include both films and games, including the new max-4-per-month limited plan which will suit lighter users.

There isn't an option for a 'games only' subscription, but you can choose to rent as many games or films as you want, so if you don't want to watch any films you don't have to, but it's nice to have the option there if you do.

Movie downloads

LoveFilm has recently started offering movie downloads, and significantly, you do not need to be a paying Lovefilm subscriber to access these films.

While there are some free titles, it is essentially a PAYG service with the option of renting a download (prices vary, but are on average £2.99), or buying a download where you can burn the film legally and keep it (prices start at around £9.99). In some cases you can buy the download to watch immediately, and Lovefilm will send you a hardcopy of the film on DVD to keep.

These Lovefilm movie downloads are becoming increasingly popular on the site, and Lovefilm now boasts over 2000 titles available for download. We strongly suspect this is the beginning of the end for DVDs-by-post, and Lovefilm is - once again - leading the pack.

LoveFilm get two-thumbs up for:
Being the closest thing to actually being in the video shop! We also love Lovefilm's massive title range, fast turnaround and innovative features.

Free trial details

	LoveFilm offer a free trial of 30 days. The free trial is available on any package. The free trial on the light use 'limited per month' are limited to 2, 3 or 4 discs within 30 days - whichever comes first. It's free, so...

Actual User Ratings

Independent Comments

		LoveFilm has won the BVA Rental Home Delivery award in 2007, 2006 and 2005. BVA (British Video Association) Awards 2007
		LoveFilm was awarded Internet Magazine's Five Star Award in a recent review. Internet Magazine
		Which? Online has rated LoveFilm with an overall performance score of 74%. LoveFilm was rated good for ease of use, features, movie range and value for money. They were rated average for performance (customer service and DVD quality). Which? Online Report

User Comments

At a Glance

Our Rating
No. of Titles	65,000 +
Free Trial	30 days
DVDs at once Max / month £3.91 £5.87 £7.82 Unlimited £9.78 Unlimited £12.72 Unlimited £15.65 £9.78 Unlimited £10.76 Unlimited £14.68 Unlimited £18.59

	DVD Types Available:
	Recent Releases		Bollywood
	Popular Choices		TV Series
	Children's & Family		Sports
	World Cinema		Adult Themed
	Game Types Available:
	Sony PS3		Sony PS2
	Sony Playstation		Sony PSP
	Xbox 360		Xbox
	Nintendo Wii		Nintendo GameCube
	Nintendo DS		Gameboy Advance

Customer Reviews

Add your own review of LoveFilm's dvd rental service...

Remember, the customer reviews below are subjective (and are not the opinions of ChooseDVDRental.co.uk).

deb from wolverhampton writes... 10/02/2009

"I were with these for several months and cancelled due to games/dvd's being scratched, the service was fast but the turnaround was terrible i hardly ever got my top choices sent out, i stringly urge anyone who looks after their console/dvd player steer well clear"

Rich from Oldbury writes... 08/12/2008

"Not bad service but many discs were scratched and hed to be thoroughly cleaned half way through watching. Watch out newbies, the cancel function is weird. It's easy to cancel the cancel and then you get stung!"

Chris from Chorley writes... 26/11/2008

"Main gripe is that if two films are due out at the same time, they send them in the same envelope, meaning that you have to send them back together, which slows down the turnaround somewhat. Not a patch on the old Amazon service, hence us looking to change."

TimC from Glos writes... 12/11/2008

"So far my experience has been excellent for Wii Game rentals. On a 2 dvd at a time deal and they usually send out at least one top pick each time (all popular titles), you just have to manage your list by keeping the choices limited to help narrow the options. One dvd wasn't received back by them but once reported rental was updated immediately, usually 4 day wait (but it was returned at same time as another title). I also use TescoDVD rental which is powered by them (also great service - 3yrs and only 1 missing disc), but I do like the extra features on the lovefilm site plus they offer better game rental options which they haven't passed on to Tesco yet. Turn around is very fast, day after posting back disc is marked as received, next rental marked dispatching soon, posted at the end of the day, day in post and receive following day (4day total), often possible to get two turnarounds per week if you get discs back before the w/e. Of course shall have to see when it comes to ending the trial if I do."

Pam Martin from Farnham, Surrey writes... 15/07/2008

"I had been an Amazon customer for years and they have forced us to all use LoveFilm now - who by comparison are rubbish. They never send you the discs in order and you end up with your lowest priority discs randomly - basically you never know what you are getting. It is a nightmare cancelling too - you have to call them to explain and they hassle you trying to give you further free trials etc. I really would not recommend LoveFilm if you have used Amazon in the past and got on great with them - try Blockbuster! "

NLS from Newcastle writes... 18/04/2008

"We've been with them a long time. The selection remains unparalleled and now that we have a rather better DVD player we rarely have problems with unplayable discs. But the customer service has plummeted. When they were ScreenSelect the customer service was excellent. Emails were dealt with by people who seemed to care about what they were doing and who paid attention to what you said. Now the people who reply seem to see one or two keywords in a mail and send a standard response, which is usually a set of instructions to do something that didn't work the first time, which was why you had emailed them... I now begin most customer service mails by asking them to put me straight on to their supervisor, as they seem to be the only people who actually read the mails, and once you get to them, they are generally fairly helpful. I wonder what the company's pay, turnover and training are like. It's a pity that what once felt like a maverick little independent has now become the lion in the jungle. The bosses and the equity companies must be making enough money to be able to pass on a bit more to the employees. In the end, a company is only as good as its employees at the coalface."

A. Higgins from Southend writes... 19/03/2008

"Have just cancelled LoveFilm after my 2 week free trial. In that time I was sent 4 dvds. They were all from my "low priority" list and one never arrived. Not impressed."

Heidi from Macclesfield writes... 18/02/2008

"5 consecutive damaged, unplayable discs, what a rubbish service! You can't escape them either because they've just bought out Amazon & they power Tesco's rental service...isn't there supposed to be a law against monopolies?"

Bill from Hampstead, London writes... 06/11/2007

"I have been with LOVEFiLM (previously ScreenSelect) for almost 4 years and have not had any disc that was a problem to play. I don't watch that much but find I always have a movie from my 'high' priorities. I particularly like Lovefilm's priority system: when I am watching 24 (I am an addict) and 24 is my only 'High' priority, and I always get it. Other times I have 3-4 High discs and am quite relaxed about which one I get. Only about twice in the last year have I ever not had a High priority disc. Well done LOVEFiLM!"

(Mr) Subash Chandran from Watford, Herts. writes... 21/09/2007

"My experience with this excellent site (for "non South Indian" movies) is different to the view of Mr Glen Banyard. I have had no complaints with Lovefilm, and it is in the nature of "Discs" that they sometimes have faults, mostly cured by "mild polishing & replaying". If fault cannot be cured, LoveFilm re-send a "fault-free" Disc. I have been very satisfied with their customer support."

Glen Banyard from Littleport writes... 15/08/2007

"Poor service, over stretched, frequency of poorly maintained and scratched discs increasing that it's more like Russian Routlette that you might get to watch a film all the way through without jumping. Customer service is a foreign concept to LoveFILM, the ASA should actually be barring them from using the phrase."