There are a lot of options and apps to stream movies and TV Shows online. Google Play Movies App offers movies on Rent and Buy, you can buy and rent movies for a month or more. In an Apk teardown by XDA Developers, it hints about adding of ad-based free streaming in Play Movies App.
<string name="athome_add_birthdate_to_watch">Add birthdate to watch</string>
<string name="athome_free_with_ads">Free with ads</string>
<string name="athome_free_with_ads_description">Hundreds of movies, just a few ads</string>
<string name="athome_introduce_free_movies">Introducing</string>
<string name="athome_watch_free_with_ads">Watch free with ads</string>
The code strings clearly show ‘Introducing’ and ‘Watch free with ads’ means Google Play Movies App will offer Hundreds of Movies with ads. This feature also adds the feature of monetization in-app. It will great to see when the feature rolls out.
There are many OTTs to watch your movies and TV Shows at home on Hotstar, Amazon Prime Video, Netflix and more. In this area, Google can compete with another streaming service in India. After the addition of this feature, Play Movies can compete with these streaming platforms. Most of the OTTs will offer monthly subscription-based service where it offers Ad based free movies.
This feature is not currently live and may arrive in a future update. In future release may be some of the features revealed in Apk teardown were not in the update. It will be great if Google Play Movies will bring ad-based free streaming.