IMDb
Shares rank 4 of 5 movie databases by recommenders
People recommend it for quick movie facts, reliable overviews and ratings. Critics say user reviews now need an account and the site is full of ads since Amazon bought it.
People recommend it for quick movie facts, reliable overviews and ratings. Critics say user reviews now need an account and the site is full of ads since Amazon bought it.
40 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 6
- criticize it
- 34
- approval share
- 15%
Recommended in 5 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 6 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 0.1 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 5 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Useful movie information and ratings
“many were interesting, by clarifying whether a movie is worth viewing”
Comment from 28 Apr 2026 in “You have to have an account to read IMDB reviews now” “The overviews on IMDB are usually pretty reliable, too.”
Comment from 7 Jan 2026 in “Amazon Prime AI overviews can't even get the basics right” “show you actually useful metrics, like the IMDB rating”
Comment from 5 Aug 2026 in “Xbox goes down. You can't play games you own on disc”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Reviews now require an account
“now that reviews are gone I guess I should stop checking their reviews and ditch this site completely”
Comment from 28 Apr 2026 in “You have to have an account to read IMDB reviews now” “amazon changing imdb.com, so that you need to actually be logged in to read any of the reviews”
Comment from 18 Jul 2026 in “What AI did to stackoverflow in a graph” “you now must be logged in to IMDB.com in order to view the User Reviews for movies”
Comment from 22 Jul 2026 in “IMDB now automatically creating user accounts when you are signed into Amazon” - Comment from 23 Jul 2026 in “So Reddit has decided that plain HTML is unsafe”
- Comment from 15 Sep 2026 in “iOS 27, iPadOS 27, and macOS 27”
- Comment from 17 Apr 2026 on Hacker News
Heavy advertising, including Amazon ads
“Even the mobile IMDB app now has ads for random products on amazon.com. It's gross.”
Comment from 4 Nov 2025 in “No Socials November” “Plenty of my work on there. Nothing to show for it, and they advertise on there.”
Comment from 5 Oct 2026 in “Blindsight (Watts Novel)” “a list of movies, directors and actors, wrapped in megabytes of ads”
Comment from 12 Oct 2026 in “Cartographers of North Korea (2019)” Accounts created without consent
“IMDb account was automatically created using the email alias I use for Amazon”
Comment from 18 Apr 2026 in “IMDB created my account for merely visiting the site” “I never wanted or asked for any account on some site I happened to visit”
Comment from 21 Apr 2026 in “IMDB created my account for merely visiting the site” Amazon ownership hurt trust
“The imdb move was truly stupid of Amazon, imo. I use to go there all the time for movie info but now its wikipedia and other alternatives and don't even bother with imdb.”
Comment from 26 Aug 2026 in “Nitter and XCancel receive cease and desist notices” “Same goes for amazon buying imdb and they've already used that to adjust scores for at least one film”
Comment from 25 Sep 2026 in “Letterboxd Is Up for Sale, and A24, Sony and the New York Times Are Bidding”
Other movie databases people recommend
The four most recommended other movie databases, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Letterboxd | 16 | 14 | 53% | 8 | — | — |
| Criterion Closet | 13 | 5 | 72% | 1 | — | — |
| JustWatch | 11 | 3 | 79% | 5 | — | Approved |
| IMDbThis page | 6 | 34 | 15% | 5 | — | — |
| CineCLI | 6 | 4 | 60% | 1 | — | — |
What people said
40 of the 44 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“a list of movies, directors and actors, wrapped in megabytes of ads”
“Plenty of my work on there. Nothing to show for it, and they advertise on there.”
“Companies like Wikimedia, Duolingo, IMDB, social media and so on, are taking unpaid labour and making money off it.”
“probably from either Wikipedia, IMDB, etc.”
“Same goes for amazon buying imdb and they've already used that to adjust scores for at least one film”
“the most ham-fisted enshittification move to raise registrations”
“after they introduced mandatory account registration to even see user reviews”
“But then if you add a space making it 'True ', 'Bill Hader' is the top result!”
“The imdb move was truly stupid of Amazon, imo. I use to go there all the time for movie info but now its wikipedia and other alternatives and don't even bother with imdb.”
“show you actually useful metrics, like the IMDB rating”
“imdb.com has decided that 'reading reviews of movies' requires an account now”
“I don't feel I can trust any site Amazon owns going forward.”
“this took me less than a few minutes with classic non-LLM search”
“Why would I use a big tech controlled resource when avoidable?”
“Amazon has been an absolutely terrible custodian of IMDb”
“you now must be logged in to IMDB.com in order to view the User Reviews for movies”
“amazon changing imdb.com, so that you need to actually be logged in to read any of the reviews”
“they added these ugly qses into every click on their site”
“now that reviews are gone I guess I should stop checking their reviews and ditch this site completely”
“many were interesting, by clarifying whether a movie is worth viewing”
“Until recently IMDB worked without javascript even.”
“acquired and kept running in a shitty state like IMDB or Twitter”
“I never wanted or asked for any account on some site I happened to visit”
“Good. Saves me the trouble of figuring out how to close it.”
“keep them alive in a terrible state like Goodreads, Imdb, BoxOfficeMojo”
“IMDb account was automatically created using the email alias I use for Amazon”
“Now, the User Review pages state, "Sign in to access user reviews."”
“it used my google account but not even my primary google account”
“counts as both dark pattern and a form of enshittification”
“couldn't find the perfect app for my needs”
“IMDb is review bombed to shit, both positive and negative.”
“100% of online reviews should be treated as manipulated.”
“loads of sites that previously worked now don't”
“I could never rate the Spawn movie zero stars on IMDB.”
“A lot of Wikipedia's content is monetised elsewhere as is IMDB's.”
“IMDB stars are probably one of the worst SNR filters you could use for film”
“The overviews on IMDB are usually pretty reliable, too.”
“neither Goodreads, IMDB nor Letterboxd have proper export APIs”
“Some applications tunnel in their ads over non-ad domains, making them unlockable.”
“Even the mobile IMDB app now has ads for random products on amazon.com. It's gross.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.