It’s Sunday afternoon, all the food has been prepared, and you’re sitting down to watch your favorite NFL team. Whether it’s the Commanders, the Ravens, or some other team, finding the game on television can be a struggle. With all the games divided over several streaming services, finding your team before game time can be one of the most frustrating things. Here’s what you need to know about each game day and which streaming service you should tune into.
For Sunday afternoon, the main streaming services are Fox and CBS. Which network hosts which games depends on the conference of the away team. Fox has the right to the National Football Conference teams, and CBS has the rights to the American Football Conference teams.
Now, if you can’t find the game on either of those networks, you can find it on YouTube TV. YouTube TV has the rights to all the games not being broadcast on CBS and Fox. However, YouTube doesn’t have the rights to any day other than Sunday. They also lack specific games, such as streaming exclusive and early international games.
Sunday night belongs to NBC alone, whereas Monday nights are split between ESPN and ABC. These games may also be found on Peacock, as they have some streaming rights. However, the YouTube Pass does not include Peacock content. Thursday nights are exclusive to Amazon Prime.
Over three nights of football, the games can be split between up to five different streaming services, which can make it difficult to find your team.
Now, if you think that the chaos ends there, you would be wrong. Netflix gets the rights to Christmas games, and NFL+, another exclusive service, has rights to international games. And if you want another add-on, NFL Redzone can be added to the YouTube TV base plan with or without the Sunday Ticket.
That brings the total amount of possible streaming services up to 11 different services. The amount of money needed to buy all the streaming services is ridiculous. Having to search everywhere to watch a football game that you then need to pay for is extremely frustrating. Although the broadcast will show highlights from the streaming service games on the main channels, it’s not the same as cheering on your team from start to finish.
Take, for example, the Giants and Broncos game this past Sunday, which was streamed on YouTube. The game had a heated lead-up, with both teams beating the reigning champions, the Eagles, in upset games. With the Giants having Jaxson Dart and Cam Skattebo, they’re such an electric team to watch, to see what the rookie duo can do. The Broncos were the first team to beat the Eagles this year, ruining the opposing team’s undefeated record. The Broncos are currently leading their division, the AFC West, following their win over the Giants, ahead of the Chargers, Chiefs, and Raiders. Although the teams have opposing records, two-five and five-two respectively, the game was fairly competitive till the last quarter, where the Broncos came back to win after Dart threw a game-shifting interception.
The game would’ve brought a lot of attention to a broadcast channel, but instead it was chosen to be streamed on YouTube. In order to watch the game, viewers would have to purchase YouTube TV along with the NFL Sunday Pass. Although this most likely made some money as die-hard fans want to watch, it tanks the viewers’ enjoyment as many people would have liked to watch the Giants lose a 19-point lead in a quarter.
The division of streaming may ultimately be the NFL’s downfall. The streaming services continue to get more expensive, and more companies will buy their way in. The average fan won’t be able to pay for all the different options, as according to Forbes, they could cost between 750 to 900 dollars. The average fan doesn’t have that kind of money to spend when it’s likely their favorite team might not be playing on every service. Understanding the need to make money is one thing, but keeping games from the fans because of it is a very different thing. The NFL needs to come up with a cheaper and easier solution to streaming.
