CHECK THESE OUT!
Popular Posts
We live in a great day and age where we can watch television anywhere we want. There are SO MANY options out there outside of paying the enormous cable bill, so today I want to share my favorite alternatives to cable.
When I started learning how to budget, cutting my cable was the first expense I had to let go. It was hard because I didn’t want to, but I had to remember my reason WHY I decided to budget in the first place.
There are so many more cost effective ways to watch your favorite shows and show many alternatives to cable. Here are my top 10 ways to save money on cable!
However, please note that I’m not advocating doing ALL of these! If you did, you’d wind up spending more than you were paying for cable. That would be dumb. I currently subscribe to Netflix and Amazon Prime. We are switching over to DIRECTV NOW starting next month because we have one AT&T phone and can use the data from that phone to watch for free.
We stream all of them through a Roku player and love it! We haven’t had cable in our house in 8 years, so my kids don’t know any different. I thought you may want to know how to cut down your cable bill as well. When you learn how to budget you see that spending hundreds on cable when you don’t have to is a waste of money!
Here are my Favorite Alternatives to Cable:
1.) DIRECTV NOW
DIRECTV NOW is a favorite! You can stream LIVE and On Demand TV from anywhere for as little as $55 per month PLUS you get your sports channels.
This is pretty cool, especially if you are an AT&T member. If you’re an AT&T Mobility customer, DIRECTV will pick up the tab for data to help you achieve all your binge-worthy goals. Data Free TV means you won’t use your AT&T mobile data for watching DIRECTV NOW or FreeVIEW in the App. This means that you can watch Direct TV From ANYWHERE for free if you are an AT&T member. (Think long car trips mommas!)
Some other great features: There is no equipment, no annual contracts, no credit checks, and you can cancel at any time!
There are 2 Prices/Packages to choose from:
- PLUS 45+ channels – $55 per month
- MAX 60+ Channels + HBO – $80 per month!
You can sign up for a free trial and try it out here.
2.) Sling TV
You can use Sling to watch LIVE and On Demand TV to your favorite channels.
Here’s why it’s awesome – you know those 3 or 4 channels that comprise 99% of your cable TV viewing? I bet they’re on Sling. If your spouse refuses to cancel cable because they need their Football, here is your solution!
Here’s what they offer for LIVE tv:
- ESPN
- ESPN2
- HGTV
- Food Network
- TBS
- History Channel
- Cartoon Network
- Disney Channel
- CNN
- TNT
- many more…
And you can try it for FREE for a week. If you’ve put off canceling cable because your husband just can’t “give up his sports”, you now have a viable option.
Try out Sling for FREE
3.) PlayOn Tv
Sign up for PlayOn TV to try a 30 day limit for Free. PlayOn TV allows you to record streaming videos and then lets you watch them for free offline. This is a great option for those of you who have limited internet at home or travel frequently.
PlayOn is a launchpad to all your favorite streaming shows, movies and more from Hulu and Netflix, to Comedy Central, and all the major networks.
You will instantly get over 100 channels, and there are tons more that you can add along the way. PlayLater is software for your computer or mobile device that records streaming media, saving it to your device for future viewing. If you already have a streaming device or gaming console, you’ve already got most of the features offered by this software, but for $39.99 for lifetime access, you won’t waste a lot of money trying it out.
Sign up for a free trial of PlayOn TV here.
4.) Hulu
Hulu offers current season tv shows, full series episodes of shows that have ended (think Seinfeld), Hulu original series like Causal and The Mindy Project and the ability to add-on Showtime ($9 a month). The base rate of $8 a month offers limited commercials but there’s the option to go commercial free for $12 a month.
5.) HBO Now
HBO NOW is only $15 a month, you get unlimited access to all of HBO’s programming which includes former and current HBO original series, as well as movies. You can watch it on a large variety of devices. With HBO Now, you’ll get Game of Thrones, Deadwood and can even revisit The Sopranos and Sex and the City.
6.) NFL Sunday Ticket
NFL Sunday Ticket running a deal right now where you get a $200 Prepaid Visa card when you sign up.
So many people have cable packages because of one thing: the NFL. If you just gotta have your football, then NFL Sunday ticket would be your way to go. It doesn’t sound cheap at $199 for the whole season, but let’s do a quick comparison…
If you’re spending $70 a month for cable, that’s $840 a year. Instead, what if you cut the cable, used Netflix at $8 a month and bought NFL Sunday Ticket? That would cost you $295 over the course of the year. You just saved $545!
7.) Showtime
Showtime Online has a unique service of being able to be added on to other services that you may already subscribe to. For $9 a month, it can be added to Amazon Prime and Hulu and for $11, Playstation Vue. Showtime offers you award-winning series like Dexter, Weeds and House of Lies as well as a large selection of movies including action, comedies and dramas added each month. The stand-alone service is $11 and it offers both live viewing and streaming.
8.) CBS All Access
With CBS All Access Over 7,500 episodes are available On Demand with new episodes added daily. You can watch live tv as well as stream them on Demand the next day. You can watch on their app, on your pc or with using devices connected to your tv like the XBox 360, Apple TV and Fire TV for $6 a month.
9.) Amazon Prime Video
You can sign up for a free trial of Prime here. For $99 ($8.25 a month) a year, you get streaming videos, original shows like Transparent and Bosch, Free Two-Day Shipping (and some same-day shipping), Free Kindle Books each month, Prime Music and much more.
10.) Philo
Sign up for a free 7 day trial of Philo here. With Philo you can get 59 channels streamed to your devices to only $20 per month! You only need a cell phone number and internet.
BONUS Program
11.) Disney+ Bundle
This bundle is AMAZING! For only $12.99 per month you can get Disney + and Hulu AND Espn+. HULU is currently $5.99 per month, so for just $7 more you get ESPN and Disney+.
With all of these options and wireless internet installed in your home, it’s easy to see that you can leave cable behind easily. You’ll save yourself some money for paying off debt, increasing your emergency fund or saving for a great vacation. The hardest part will be choosing which cable-free option works best for your family!
Disclosure: There are a few affiliate links in this post. It helps keep this website running, which we greatly appreciate! You can read my disclosure policy here.
COMMENTS