Netflix acquires avatar-creation platform Ready Player Me

• Around 20 Ready Player Me staff will join Netflix, with only CTO Rainer Selvet moving over among the founders.
• Ready Player Me’s technology enables a single digital identity to carry across multiple games and virtual worlds.
• Founded 12 years ago in Estonia, the company evolved from early avatar experiments into a global interoperability platform.

Avatar-creation platform Ready Player Me has been acquired by Netflix for an undisclosed fee. 

As reported by TechCrunch, around 20 staff from Ready Player Me will join Netflix following the acquisition, with only CTO Rainer Selvet moving over among the four founders. 

Netflix said it does not yet have a timeline for when avatars will launch, nor has it specified which games or genres will be first to use the technology.

Ready Player Me's tech allows players to create a single digital identity that can be carried across multiple games and virtual worlds, supporting personalisation and player continuity.

Following the acquisition, Ready Player Me will shut down its services on January 31st, 2026, including its online avatar creation tool, PlayerZero.

Global reach 

Founded 12 years ago in Estonia, the avatar-creation platform began as a passion project centred on avatars before evolving through several products, including hardware scanners and personal avatar tools. 

Over its lifetime, the company raised $72 million in funding and built a team focused exclusively on avatar identity and cross-platform use cases. 

“Our vision has always been to enable avatars and identities to travel across many games and virtual worlds," said Ready Player Me CEO Timmu Tõke in a post. “We've been on an independent path to make that vision a reality for a long time. 

“I'm now very excited for the Ready Player Me team to join Netflix to scale our tech and expertise to a global audience and contribute to the exciting vision Netflix has for gaming."