DVD365 closed in mid-2005 after being acquired by Screenselect, which in turned merged with Lovefilm in late 2006--this review is kept as it was for historical purposes.
DVD 365 has one of the slickest-looking websites around--easy to use with a good selection. It was established in 2003 and boasts an impressive catalogue of over 27,000 films--just a bit shy of the market leaders. Its browse-by-genre selection is disappointing, but it gains points for being its search engine which works by titles, actors, and directors.
We also like the 1-5 star ratings, and the fact that in early 2005 it added member reviews. Although they're based in Scotland, suggesting there could be slight delays to southern England, most reports we've seen of their service and speed are glowing.
DVD 365 was long the third in the UK's "big three" of purely online DVD rental companies behind ScreenSelect/Video Island and Lovefilm. Like them, DVD 365 had gotten into the "powering" game, running the Qflicks, Movietrak, and Mailbox Movies sites. In June 2005, Screenselect announced it was acquiring rival DVD 365 along with its three affiliate companies (see new story). Given the inevitable disruption during the takeover, we'd steer clear from this site for a few months.
A dissapointment in an otherwise excellent site is their lack of a customer service phone number.
When we asked, they claimed to have 4,000 adult DVD titles, though this appears unlikely and we did not list this figure on the comparison table; it may depend on a different definition of "adult"--as both industry leaders Screenselect and Lovefilm, who both have larger total inventories, only stock 1,200 and 1,300 adult films respectively.
Prices: DVD 365 offer many subscription options: 1 DVD at a time for £9.99 per month (limit 10 discs), 2 DVDs for £12.99 per month (limit 15 discs), 3 DVDs for £14.99 per month (limit 20 discs), 4 DVDs for £21.99 (limit 30 discs), and 5 DVDs for £26.99 per month (limit 40 discs). They also offer three "Lite" services on the Amazon model which we don't really recommend, but which may work for infrequent users. They offer a 14-day trial. Note that DVD 365 is not actually unlimited, there is a limit of 20 DVDs for the 3 disc montly package, but since this threshold is set very high it will not affect most viewers, so we really can't fault it.
DVD 365 is a strong company/site, but given disruption from its July 2005 takeover by Screenselect, now is probably not the time to start a subscription--
Rental Basics