Unless you happen to be a sound engineer and are able to figure out how to tune equalisers on your TV, there's a good chance you'll have some issues with audio when watching.
For example, the explosions may be ridiculously loud whilst the dialogue is barely above whisper. Not only that, the audio itself can sound a little flat and dull. While Netflix can't come over to your house and tune your TV properly, it instead can give a higher bitrate of audio.
Per an official release from the streaming giant, Netflix is now introducing high-quality audio going from 192 kpbs (decent) to 640 kpbs (very good) for 5.1 Audio, and from 448 kbps to 768 kbps for Dolby Atmos. The last part, however, only applies if you have a Premium account.
What do all those figures mean, you're asking? In short, it means higher quality audio and a crisper, cleaner sound. Netflix is touting this feature pretty hard, claiming that while the audio isn't lossless, it is supposed to be indistinguishable from the original source. The whole thing came about when 'Stranger Things' producers The Duffer Brothers brought up issues with sound on the opening episode of the second season.
On top of all this, Netflix also states the new feature will work depending on your ISP's bandwidth, meaning that the audio itself will be adaptive depending on how much data you're able to download. Again, all of this is supposed to be seamless, so you won't have to touch a thing to get this working.
The feature rolls out on Netflix's TV apps from today.
