Your Peloton Might Have a Secret Netflix App

Seemingly, for a giant-screen exercise bike, the Peloton would give you an easy way to watch movies while you pedal. But until recently, the screen was reserved for workout-related content only. Some Peloton users, myself included, have discovered that the bike already has the Netflix app secretly enabled. Here’s how to turn it on.

First, a word of caution: we don’t know how widely available this app is or if Peloton might remove it without notice. Peloton is beta testing an “entertainment” option on its rides, but only offers YouTube TV for now ( as opposed to regular YouTube ). Beta users were briefly able to watch Prime Video, but this has since been removed . However, there is reason to hope that Netflix will soon be added to the entertainment options.

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• Original Peloton bike
• Peloton Bike+ with swivel screen and automatic resistance

How to watch Netflix on your Peloton

There are potentially several ways to access Netflix on your Peloton. One of the old tricks is to open the browser built into the system for debugging; through it you can get to netflix.com. But the new Netflix app appears to be available in one of two ways.

First, the one that many users say works for them (but didn’t work for me):

1. Tap the settings menu in the top right corner of the screen.
2. Go to Applications.
3. Find the Netflix app and tap the icon to open it.

I found the app this way but couldn’t open it from that menu. (Pressing it did nothing, and there was no button to open the app.)

But here’s what worked for me. It’s like a browser trick, but it ends up showing the actual Netflix app that shows your cycling stats along with the movie you’re watching:

1. Log in to your Peloton as usual.
2. Tap the three-dot menu at the bottom right corner of the screen and select About.
3. The About screen is displayed as a white rectangle in the middle of the screen. Touch the lower right corner of this rectangle several times. Tap tap tap tap tap tap tap…
4. A new black screen will appear. I saw two icons: the system browser and the Netflix app . Touch this app to launch it.

Here is a video showing what I mean:

Once you launch the app, you will need to sign into your existing Netflix account and then you can watch shows and movies as you normally would. A vertical bar appears on the right side of the screen showing cadence, resistance, time you pedaled, and so on. (You need to press “Start” to start recording your trip.)

Last night I watched a 30 minute video via the app, an episode of a show that looked like it would be about archeology but constantly implied that Göbekli Tepe was built by some mysterious advanced civilization from the stars. (It wasn’t “Ancient Aliens” , but some kind of copycat show that was really meant to forget about aliens and tell us more about Göbekli Tepe , an extremely cool place with a lot known and a lot unknown.)

By the end, I had a “Recreational” ride in my training history, complete with my performance chart and all the usual metrics. The old browser hack for watching Netflix didn’t save your workout or provide you with metrics during your ride. So if you’ve been wanting to watch your favorite shows while cycling, check if you have the secret Netflix app turned on.