Sandra Bullock's 'Bird Box' viewed by 45 million accounts in one week, Netflix claims

Netflix is notoriously secretive about viewership numbers, but, on Friday afternoon, the streamer was happy to tweet out the number of accounts that it says has watched its latest original, Bird Box, starring Sandra Bullock.

"45,037,125 Netflix accounts have already watched Bird Box," tweeted the streamer, which added that the movie, released in the US on Dec 21, is the best first seven-day showing for a Netflix film to date.

Of course, there is no way to verify Netflix's claim and, moreover, it is unclear if the company categorises a "view" as an account that has watched the entire feature or has watched the movie for a couple of minutes before returning to The Great British Bake Off.

Susanne Bier directed the adaptation of the 2014 novel of the same name by Josh Malerman, which follows a mother (Bullock) who has to guide herself and her children, while blindfolded, through a post-apocalyptic Earth where supernatural forces take the appearance of their victims' worst fears, according to Hollywood Reporter.

This is the second time this month that Netflix has offered insight into its audience's viewing habits. On Dec 11, Netflix released nondescript data that included the 2018 shows that had the highest "binge quotient" — or the highest average watch time per viewing session. (On My Block, Making a Murderer: Part 2 and 13 Reasons Why season 2 took the top three slots). In that same release, the streamer also said that more than 50 per cent of viewers of its rom-coms The Kissing Booth and To All the Boys I've Loved Before watched them more than once, but it is unclear how big its audience is.

For what it's worth, Friday's tweet is the first time that Netflix has offered any sort of quantitative viewership number for one of its original films, whatever that may mean.