There’s a new option to try if you want to watch TV for free online (UK only).
TV Catchup provides online access to around 40 channels, including:
- BBC1, BBC2, BBC3, BBC4
- ITV1, ITV2, ITV3, ITV4
- Channel 4, Channel 4 +1, Film 4, E4
- Five
- Dave
- Sky News, Sky Sports News
- Virgin 1
To access the channels you will have to sign up (and as I mentioned, you’ll have to be based in the U.K., using a U.K. internet service provider) , and you’ll have to sit through an advert before you can start viewing channels, along with any adverts that appear on the channel itself.
The TV Catchup player is reasonably straight-forward to use, the picture quality is good, although on my first trial the picture was breaking up, making it pretty unwatchable. This is something that most TV streaming sites seem to suffer from (especially ITV), but this could be down to the amount of bandwidth being used, so you’d hope it would be a problem that they can iron out over time.
Whilst I’m not sure it will get much regular viewing in our household, TVCatchup does add another option for watching TV shows where there’s no TV or access to a Freeview box or Sky connection. It has a good selection of channels to choose from, and there’s also an app in development to allow you to watch TV on your iPhone, so there really is no escape from those endless repeats of Friends.