Netflix Inc.'s price increase on one of its most popular movie-rental plans is pushing many customers to choose between getting films in the mail or online, revealing a split between the company and some subscribers over how quickly to shift viewing habits.

The move, announced Tuesday, is a significant change for the Los Gatos, Calif., company, which has grown quickly over the past few years while billing itself as a hybrid of new and old movie formats, offering the best of both worlds. Customers could pick from the wide selection of Netflix's DVD catalog, while enjoying the convenience of instantly streaming television shows and movies from its smaller online library, for as little as $9.99 a month.

Its price change, though, will most heavily impact those customers who still want their movies in both formats. They will now need to pay $15.98 a month to stream movies and check out one DVD at a time, a 60% increase over the previous price for that plan.

The price increase caused a firestorm among Netflix customers online, who jammed the company's corporate blogs with mostly negative reactions, until maxing out the number of comments allowed on the site at 5,000. On Twitter, messages containing the words "Dear Netflix"—most of them critical—made that phrase a top "trending topic" on the service Wednesday.

For many people though, the Netflix changes could encourage them to save money by switching to cheaper plans, including an existing $7.99-a-month streaming-only option and a new DVD-only rental plan for the same price.