Last Updated on November 5, 2026
I bet it’s happened to you if you travel, you start watching a film or television programme available in one country then discover it’s missing when you travel home. Or you might see someone recommending a film in America, search for it on your UK Netflix account, and find absolutely nothing. Then perhaps Netflix suggests a few alternatives, none of which were what you wanted to watch. It’s frustrating and annoying and it honestly seems to be getting worse.
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It’s definitely not a technical fault but just the way Netflix acquires content. You see the company has different licensing agreements in different countries, so its catalogue changes depending on where you’re watching. The changes can be quite small depending on where you conenct from but in other cases there’s a massive difference.
For years, VPNs have offered a possible way around these regional differences. Simply, connect to a server in another country, open Netflix, and see what becomes available – it will change although you might not find the film you want!
But at least it’s an option – and if you’re looking for a blcokbuster then it’s often quite straight forward. Unfortunately, many are now finding this doesn’t work any more, VPNs are being blocked automatically and people can’t access. Although one VPN provider has come up in a solution which is what we’re going to look at here.
We recently tested NordVPN’s streaming technology, called SmartPlay, to find out.
Why changing your IP address isn’t always enough
A VPN changes the public IP address websites see about your connection when you visit their site. For example, connecting to a VPN server in New York generally makes your internet connection appear to originate from the United States. That sounds like it should be good enough for accessing the American version of Netflix.
Unfortunately, streaming platforms have become rather good at recognising commercial VPN connections. Many, in fact pretty much all of the VPN servers are operated from data centres, and their IP addresses are well documented. Netflix can identify certain connections as belonging to VPN services, even when those addresses are located in the country you’ve selected. It’s not just Netflix – streaming sites like BBC iPlayer do the same.
Some suggest that Netflix doesn’t necessarily block everything when this happens. Depending on the circumstances, you may be limited to programmes available internationally rather than seeing the full regional catalogue. I’ve not experienced this as it seems to be either access or completely blocked but peopel do report it happening.
It could explain the situation where a VPN can appear to be working perfectly while Netflix still refuses to show the films you expected.
What makes SmartPlay different?
So as we’ve mentioned, NordVPN uses a feature called SmartPlay, which combines its conventional VPN service with SmartDNS technology. You might remember SmartDNS as it allows particular streaming-related connections to be handled differently from ordinary website traffic. It was initially marketed as a cut price VPN which worked just for streaming. But, behind the scenes, this can involve specialised DNS responses and forwarding infrastructure, rather than simply sending every connection through the same conventional route.
For NordVPN’s version then you don’t have to activate SmartPlay separately. It’s integrated into NordVPN’s normal connection process and you don’t need to manually change DNS settings. We investigated some of the technical details using network tests, but the more useful question for most viewers is straightforward: does Netflix actually work?
Testing American Netflix
So what happened, well we connected to a NordVPN server in the United States. The connection was identified as being in New York by Fast.com, Netflix’s own recommended internet speed-testing service. Next, we opened Netflix and searched for a film we knew wasn’t available on our ordinary UK connection. We used The Devil Wears Prada. It’s an older film, but it was a useful test because we could confirm that it was available in the US catalogue and missing from the UK one.
- Through the American VPN connection, the film appeared and played successfully.
- We left it running for approximately two minutes without encountering playback problems.
- When we returned to our normal UK connection, Netflix displayed a message explaining that the film wasn’t available.
- That was a much more useful result than simply watching the Netflix homepage load.
- It demonstrated access to a regional title that wasn’t offered through our normal connection.
We also switched NordVPN to a French server and opened Netflix again. The service loaded normally through the French connection, the catalogue changed to the French version although we didn’t separately verify playback of a France-exclusive title.
Watch the practical demonstration
We’ve recorded the connection tests, along with a short explanation of what SmartPlay does behind the scenes. The video also shows the unusual networking behaviour we discovered while testing Netflix.
Does this mean every Netflix region will work?
Not necessarily althoug potentially it does allow this to happen. However, Netflix regularly changes its catalogue, and VPN detection methods can change too. A connection that works today may behave differently in a few months. There’s also a distinction between accessing Netflix and accessing the specific regional catalogue you’re looking for.
Our US test confirmed that we could play content unavailable on our normal UK connection. The French test confirmed that Netflix opened through the French VPN connection, but didn’t establish the availability of a particular French-exclusive programme. We also can’t prove that SmartPlay alone was responsible for the successful playback. Our network tests do, however, show that NordVPN uses specialised DNS handling for Netflix.
The practical lesson is that modern streaming VPNs involve more than obtaining an IP address in another country. For anyone who regularly travels, follows international television releases or simply wants to understand why Netflix offers different programmes in different places, it’s worth knowing how these systems operate.
Just remember that regional availability is never permanent, and no VPN provider can guarantee access to every streaming catalogue. For this particular test, though, NordVPN’s American connection did exactly what we wanted it to do.