FYI YouTube TV is getting a Rate Hike starting January from $72.99 to $82.99. I set a reminder to cancel after the bowl game.

My subscription runs out on the 28th, so perfect timing for the bowl game. I was only using it for football anyway.

Anyone have recommendations on what else is out there? I have the 4k package so I was already paying $83/month. I'll just remove it after my next bill cycle and my budget will remain the same. Just want to hear any other options that are out there.

Yep, I only have until the end of the football, then i'm cancelling.

Yeah I only watch college football and F1 races on YTTV. Guess I'll cancel mine as well and pick up F1 TV when the new season starts and then only get YTTV during football season.

#1 said:

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Anyone have recommendations on what else is out there? I have the 4k package so I was already paying $83/month. I'll just remove it after my next bill cycle and my budget will remain the same. Just want to hear any other options that are out there.

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Everything is about the same price now. YTTV was the last to raise prices. It's all because of Disney. ESPN is the biggest piece of the pie these TV providers have to pay.

Disney tried to undercut these providers too by releasing Venu sports, but Fubo filed an antitrust lawsuit. Venu would've been all the sports, College, NFL, NBA, MLB, F1, etc under a $42/month subscription.

F1 TV is great. Can watch the Sky Sports or International feed. Also only $89 for the year.

jr15aggie said:

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At least I knew I had a really great deal going back when I first signed up ~ 4 years ago. I knew that the price was way too good to last and was simply a way to get people to drop their cable providers.

And it worked... I will never go back to Cable/Satellite. It's just way too convenient to watch on any TV/Phone/Device anywhere.

Great product... a shame it's going up again... but it's SUPER easy to cancel during the football offseason which I definitely might be doing.

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My parents, at one point, had Spectrum/TWC, and two DirectTV subscriptions for hill country locations. The consolidated per my doing, to YTTV, and reduced their monthly bill by 65-70%.

evan_aggie said:

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jr15aggie said:

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At least I knew I had a really great deal going back when I first signed up ~ 4 years ago. I knew that the price was way too good to last and was simply a way to get people to drop their cable providers.

And it worked... I will never go back to Cable/Satellite. It's just way too convenient to watch on any TV/Phone/Device anywhere.

Great product... a shame it's going up again... but it's SUPER easy to cancel during the football offseason which I definitely might be doing.

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My parents, at one point, had Spectrum/TWC, and two DirectTV subscriptions for hill country locations. The consolidated per my doing, to YTTV, and reduced their monthly bill by 65-70%.

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But that's not really YTTV being cheaper than alternatives. That's just them having no clue what they're paying for.

If you stay on it, cable is likely a cheaper option.

We switched from Xfinity (internet, cable, and mobile) to AT&T (phones and internet) and DirecTV Stream and our bill is going up about 30%. My CC was offering a $50 off DirecTV Stream each of the next 3 months and I'm just annoyed with Xfinity so that's why we switched. Plan on cancelling in January. Will see what I want to do before baseball season starts.

YouBet said:

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Sweet Kitten Feet said:

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I'm just sick of them adding "content" that I don't want. Quit bloating the guide with useless **** and then tell me you're adding awesome content. No regional sports, no mlb network but by golly here's a giant **** sandwich of obscure networks for you.

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Again, we are going full circle back to cable/satellite.

You younger kids are getting to go back in time!

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LOL, I'm 46 my man. Seen it all before and knew it would come back to this eventually. Something better will come along before long too and we'll all move again.

For those that don't know, you can easily find multiple good live streams on regular Youtube for college football especially for the bigger games. Yes it's illegal for the streamer to be doing this and sometimes their streams will eventually be cutoff, but I've found it only happens like 25% of the time. And even if it happens, you can easily find another live stream to resume watching.

YouBet said:

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Pman17 said:

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The only thing we got out of cord cutting is 0 contracts.

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For now!

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Great point. Do any of them offer discounts for paying up front for 6 months or full year?

YouBet said:

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Pman17 said:

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The only thing we got out of cord cutting is 0 contracts.

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For now!

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Great point. Do any of them offer discounts for paying up front for 6 months or a full year of service?

rynning said:

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YouBet said:

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Pman17 said:

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The only thing we got out of cord cutting is 0 contracts.

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For now!

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Great point. Do any of them offer discounts for paying up front for 6 months or full year?

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I haven't looked lately but they used to. It wasn't really worth it from what I recall. Maybe $10 off over a year.

I think Sling TV has a 3-month pay up front discount.

Has anyone tried one of these? https://mysuperboxtv.co/products/superbox-s6-max

Its an android appliance that kinda works as a sketchy tv streaming device for only the one time expense.

I just stumbled into it the other day while digging for yttv alternatives and was surprised I hadn't heard of it before. There is some sparse info online about it, but mostly about the hardware and not the "service".

Im guessing it ends up being to much hassle and inconvenience with the need for the box to work, but was still interested in hearing some opinions. A bit pricey to just get for tinkering.

Pman17 said:

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The only thing we got out of cord cutting is 0 contracts.

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But this is a pretty big thing.


The way things have gotten, it really makes no financial sense for someone moderately tech savvy to have cable/sat UNLESS they want the sports. Sports, specifically ESPN, has driven up the cost of cable and the Internet versions like YTTV and HULU Plus.

Now, it also makes no sense for an older person with financial stability to get frustrated with jumping to different content providers to find the game or show they want when they are fine with their cable as it is.

Cable/sat with the DVR was the best product. So easy to jump between games and find what is playing. I just hated the 2 year commitment and then the phone calls and switching at the end of it. It's nice to not have to pay for cable from late January through the start of September.

I cancelled YTTV b/c the price hike reminded me that outside of college football the only time anyone in the house watches it is my wife for the Food Network and Investigation Discovery. Discovery+ has a $5/mo streaming option that includes those two channels so I'm going to go with that.

The kids never watch YTTV and I only watch it for college football and a little NFL.

I wish Venu wasn't blocked by Fubo b/c that would have been the most economic option for those of us who just want sports.

The kids watach their cartoons on Netflix so I'll pay the $10/month for that. We have Prime for the shipping and they have a catalog of stuff but no one really watches it. We have a trial for Hulu, Disney and ESPN+ so I'm not sure I'll stick with that or not b/c I don't think anyone watches it.

Now if I could just find a sports package for under $50/month I'd be set.

I may pickup the Fanduel option to watch the Astros for $20/month when baseball season starts. But if the MLB streaming option includes Astros home games then I'll do that since it is only $6/month.

Edit: it looks like Venu will happen after all!
https://www.reuters.com/business/media-telecom/disney-nears-deal-merge-hulu-live-tv-business-into-fubo-bloomberg-news-reports-2025-01-06/

Sweet! I think they'll launch it this Spring. The service was supposed to launch in the Fall.

When all services we use are up and running at the same time, we now pay more than we did for DTV on a monthly basis which is ~$155-160. That includes YTTV, Netflix, MAX, AppleTV, and Prime.

How much would you have paid for DTV, Netflix, AppleTV & Prime?

Just came here to post this. Will be interesting to see how much and what is covered by Venu Sports.

Additionally, ESPNs "Flagship" streaming service is also supposed to be right around the corner

https://www.businessinsider.com/espn-ad-streaming-2025-flagship-venu-2024-12

Fenrir said:

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How much would you have paid for DTV, Netflix, AppleTV & Prime?

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Would net about $30 more for month looking at current DTV Satellite prices with equivalent lineup to YTTV. $120 vs $90 and I think $120 is about what we paid back then, if I recall.

So, partially valid question but I feel like it's sort of apples and oranges and it's probably not even valid to compare them, frankly. AppleTV and Prime didn't really exist when we had DTV and I wouldn't have added them at current prices when I was already paying $120 just for DTV and whatever I was paying for the 3 disc Netflix plan.

When streaming TV started it was less than half of what it is now so having multiple services wasn't a big deal. ****, Prime has increased 50% just in 2 years so I'm about to cancel that one out of sheer principle.

As YTTV and Hulu continue to increase price it's becoming a deal for many. Not saying i want to go back because there are still contracts with DTV and weather issues with SAT and having all of that equipment is a PITA. PQ is better on DTV SAT though.

YouBet said:

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Fenrir said:

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How much would you have paid for DTV, Netflix, AppleTV & Prime?

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Would net about $30 more for month looking at current DTV Satellite prices with equivalent lineup to YTTV. $120 vs $90 and I think $120 is about what we paid back then, if I recall.

So, partially valid question but I feel like it's sort of apples and oranges and it's probably not even valid to compare them, frankly. AppleTV and Prime didn't really exist when we had DTV and I wouldn't have added them at current prices when I was already paying $120 just for DTV and whatever I was paying for the 3 disc Netflix plan.

When streaming TV started it was less than half of what it is now so having multiple services wasn't a big deal. ****, Prime has increased 50% just in 2 years so I'm about to cancel that one out of sheer principle.

As YTTV and Hulu continue to increase price it's becoming a deal for many. Not saying i want to go back because there are still contracts with DTV and weather issues with SAT and having all of that equipment is a PITA. PQ is better on DTV SAT though.

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Even moreso when you consider the good content created is now split up between many streaming services. It was much more consolidated then. Sure, we have more content now. But a lot is crap.

It will be interesting to see what impact this will have on the other providers like yttv. They've been wanting to do skinny sport bundles and Disney said no. Maybe that will change.

YouBet said:

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Fenrir said:

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How much would you have paid for DTV, Netflix, AppleTV & Prime?

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Would net about $30 more for month looking at current DTV Satellite prices with equivalent lineup to YTTV. $120 vs $90 and I think $120 is about what we paid back then, if I recall.

So, partially valid question but I feel like it's sort of apples and oranges and it's probably not even valid to compare them, frankly. AppleTV and Prime didn't really exist when we had DTV and I wouldn't have added them at current prices when I was already paying $120 just for DTV and whatever I was paying for the 3 disc Netflix plan.

When streaming TV started it was less than half of what it is now so having multiple services wasn't a big deal. ****, Prime has increased 50% just in 2 years so I'm about to cancel that one out of sheer principle.

As YTTV and Hulu continue to increase price it's becoming a deal for many. Not saying i want to go back because there are still contracts with DTV and weather issues with SAT and having all of that equipment is a PITA. PQ is better on DTV SAT though.

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Exactly my point about these discussions. People add additional services and content and are somehow surprised it may cost more in total.

I'm not too surprised that YTTV has raised prices, because of their unlimited DVR feature. I believe that nearly every program/movie/etc on every channel is being recorded because someone, somewhere has decided that they want to record it.

For example, maybe hard to believe, but I used to know people who recorded Home Shopping Club. So, I believe, considering everyone across the US, everything is being recorded. As new programs are created and new channels are added, storage/delivery costs explode.

I know some recordings expire, because they have for me, but the recording availability duration is pretty long and generous.

I suspect that YTTV may start enforcing their recording availability duration and/or making unlimited DVR as a pay feature.