Casting has perished. Long live casting!

This is Lowpass by Janko Roettgers, a newsletter focused on the continuously changing nexus of technology and entertainment, published exclusively for The Verge subscribers weekly.

Last month, Netflix surprised many by deciding to eliminate a significant function: Without any forewarning, the company eliminated the capability to cast videos from its mobile applications to numerous smart TVs and streaming gadgets. Casting is now available solely on older Chromecast streaming devices that lack a remote, Nest Hub smart displays, and select Vizio and Compal smart TVs.

This marks a remarkable shift for the streaming giant. Before these changes, Netflix had allowed casting to a broad array of devices that officially supported Google’s casting technology, including Android TVs produced by brands such as Philips, Polaroid, Sharp, Skyworth, Soniq, Sony, Toshiba, and Vizio, based on an archived version of Netflix’s site.

However, the streaming platform did not stop there. Before the previous month’s modifications, Netflix also provided a feature referred to as “Netflix 2nd Screen” casting compatibility on a vast range of additional gadgets, including Sony’s PlayStation, TVs produced by LG and Samsung, Roku TVs and streaming devices, among many others. In essence, if a smart TV or streaming device had the Netflix app, it likely also had casting capabilities.

The foundation for this technology was actually laid by Netflix 15 years ago. In 2011, several of the company’s engineers were investigating ways to more effectively integrate users’ smartphones with their televisions. “Around the same period, we found out that the YouTube team was interested in a similar idea — they had already initiated some work on [second] screen applications,” noted Scott Mirer, who was Netflix’s director of product management at the time, in 2013.

The two organizations began collaborating and sought assistance from television manufacturers like Sony and Samsung. The outcome was DIAL (short for “Discovery and Launch”) — an open secondary-screen protocol that standardized casting.

In 2012, Netflix was the first significant streaming service to introduce a casting capability in its mobile application, which at that time enabled PlayStation 3 users to start video playback from their smartphones. A year later, Google released its first Chromecast device, which took inspiration from DIAL and integrated it into Google’s proprietary casting framework.

For some time, casting was incredibly well-received. Google sold over 100 million Chromecast devices, and Vizio even created an entire television model built around casting, which included a tablet instead of a remote control. (It failed. People evidently still appreciate physical remotes.)

However, as smart TVs grew increasingly sophisticated, and streaming platforms dedicated more resources to native applications on those televisions, the necessity for casting gradually diminished. At CES, a streaming service operator informed me that casting used to be crucial for his service. Nowadays, even among the service’s Android users, merely around 10 percent engage in casting.

For Netflix, it’s improbable that the company will reverse its decision regarding casting. Netflix opted not to provide a comment when questioned about discontinuing the function. My conjecture is that casting was traded off for newer features like cloud gaming and interactive voting. Gaming especially involves multi-device connectivity, as Netflix uses smartphones as game controllers. Integrating casting into that equation could simply have been overly intricate.

Nonetheless, not everyone has abandoned casting. In fact, the technology continues to find new advocates. Last month, Apple integrated Google Cast support into its Apple TV app on Android for the first time. Additionally, over the last two years, both Samsung and LG have incorporated Google’s casting technology into some of their television models.

“Google Cast remains a key experience that we’re committed to — facilitating seamless content sharing from smartphones to TVs, whether you’re at home or in a hotel,” states Google’s Android platform PM Neha Dixit. “Keep an eye out for more developments this year.”

Google’s initiatives are facing competition from the Connectivity Standards Alliance, the organization behind the Matter smart home standard, which developed its own Matter Casting protocol. Matter Casting promises a more open approach to casting and theoretically enables streaming services and device manufacturers to implement second-screen applications in their products without needing to make agreements with Google.

“We have long been proponents of utilizing open technology standards to provide customers with greater options when it comes to using their devices and services,” states Amazon Device Software & Services VP Tapas Roy, whose company is a significant supporter of Matter and its casting technology. “We endorse and encourage media developers who aim to adhere to an open standard with the implementation of Matter Casting.”

So far, support has been scarce. Fire TVs and Echo Show devices are the only platforms that back Matter Casting, and Amazon’s own applications were largely the only ones taking advantage of this capability. Last month, Tubi also joined the ranks by integrating Matter Casting into its mobile platforms.

Connectivity Standards Alliance technology strategist Christopher LaPré acknowledges that Matter Casting has yet to achieve major success. “Honestly, I own Fire TVs, and I’ve never employed it,” he admits.

In addition to a lack of available content, LaPré also believes that Matter Casting suffers from brand muddle. The issue: Television manufacturers have started to implement Matter into their devices to allow users to control smart lights and thermostats from their couches. As a result, a television that features the Matter logo may not necessarily support Matter Casting.

Nevertheless, LaPré is optimistic that Matter Casting could see an uplift from two recent advancements: Matter recently incorporated support for cameras, introducing a new category of homegrown content that users might wish to cast. The consortium is also actively working on extending casting beyond screens.

“Audio casting is an initiative we’re pursuing,” LaPré confirms. “Numerous speaker manufacturers have shown interest in that area.” The goal is to roll out Matter audio casting later this year, at which point device developers, content creators, and consumers may also reconsider video casting.