>
Launched in April 2018, ESPN Plus brings much of ESPN’s prowess to its own on-demand streaming platform. Get top sports coverage on the go, from exclusive live streams of baseball, football, UFC, hockey and more. A fantastic service for cord cutters, ESPN Plus offers an alternative way to watch sports via traditional cable and satellite TV.
Offered as a standalone streaming service for ESPN’s regular linear coverage, ESPN Plus offers live games, access to what was formerly known as ESPN Insider content, as well as exclusive on-demand documentaries and shows.
Coupled with the fact you can also bundle it with other streaming services Disney Plus and Hulu (opens in new tab)and it’s going to be an even more compelling offering for existing cable subscribers and sporty cord-cutters alike.
Keep reading to learn more about ESPN Plus. We’ll give you more of an idea of what’s included, how much it costs, and where to stream all your favorite sports action on ESPN Plus.
What is ESPNPlus?
ESPN Plus is one of the best streaming services for people who want to stream sports, offering a package of sports-powered ESPN. The package brings together live events, on-demand content, and original programming not found on any other ESPN network – and juxtaposes them with free content from ESPN’s parent service.
It’s important to point out that while it’s content-separate from everything else on ESPN, it shares many of the same characteristics with the content you’re used to watching. Namely, the highly produced sports content that focuses on the biggest leagues, players and teams in the NHL, MLB, MLS, NFL and NBA. Subscribe to it and you’ll often hover between the different leagues, select teams to follow and watch highlights from their latest game or make predictions about what’s next for them.
So, you can think of ESPN Plus as an affordable add-on streaming service that gives you extra shows, behind-the-scenes content, and most importantly, an ad-free environment to watch the content you already love. While ESPN Plus may not offer the exact same content you’ve come to love on standard ESPN, it offers you much more of the same type of content.
(opens in new tab)
What Does ESPN Plus Offer?
Watch every out-of-market MLS game, in addition to one NHL and MLB game per day during their respective regular seasons. You can also watch live sporting events such as the PGA Tour of golf, top level boxing matches and lots of international football.
But perhaps the biggest coup ESPN Plus has pulled off to date is the right to live stream all UFC events in the US. Every Fight Night and numbered PPV event will now be shown on ESPN Plus – although the latter will, of course, require PPV spend.
Football
- Bundesliga
- Emirates FA Cup
- La Liga
- Cup del Rey
- Carabao cup
- EFL Championship
- US Open cup
Fights
Secondary school
- Atlantic A10 conference
- Big Sky Conference
- ECAC hockey
- OVC
- Patriotic League
- Sunbelt Championship
- The Ivy League
Basketball
Tennis
- Australian Open
- Wimbledon
- US open
- World Table Tennis
golf
- PGA tour
- Masters
- PGA Southern Hills
In addition to all the live sports offered to stream with a subscription, ESPN Plus also adds value to your monthly payment with plenty of original programming. For those MMA fans competing just for the UFC, there’s original content including Dana White’s Contender Series, UFC Destined and Ariel & The Bad Guy, plus classic fights, replays and there’s also the benefit of fewer ads.
That said, if you’re not a cable subscriber and the only service you buy is ESPN Plus, you’re missing out on quite a bit of programming: While we were busy watching that English EFL Championship game, ESPN played Apologies for the interruption; ESPN2 had NFL Live and ESPN3 had some upcoming boxing matches.
Without cable, you can’t tune into any of them – and because the services are so closely linked, you’re constantly reminded of all the content you can’t watch.
(opens in new tab)
ESPN Plus trial and subscriptions at a glance
One of ESPN Plus’ biggest selling points is quite affordable. With ESPN Plus fees seeing a second price hike in the second half of 2022, you can now choose to pay $9.99 per month (opens in new tab) (starting at $6.99).
Better yet, you can save 15% when you sign up for the annual plan, which costs now $99.99 per year (opens in new tab).
While we said goodbye to the free trial of ESPN Plus for new members in 2020, this affordable rate allows you to check out the service and see if the catalog of content is for you.
(opens in new tab)
How to Get the ESPN Plus Bundle
If you can’t really justify another streaming subscription – and one that’s exclusively for sports – then there’s another option that might be suitable.
ESPN is jointly owned by Disney, so there’s a bundle that lets you get ESPN Plus, Disney Plus, and Hulu for a flexible monthly fee of just $12.99 — known as the Disney Plus Bundle. You can sign up for the discounted bundle by heading to the Disney Plus website here (opens in new tab).
This means that in addition to all the sports content ESPN Plus offers, you also get access to a vault of classic Disney animations, Pixar movies, 31 seasons of The Simpsons and documentaries from National Geographic plus the entire Marvel and Star Wars movie library. through Disney Plus. Plus, you get incredible entertainment from Hulu’s top-notch library of originals like Nine Perfect Strangers and The Handmaid’s Tale.
What devices can I watch ESPN Plus on?
All things considered, ESPN Plus is pretty easy to tune. That’s because ESPN Plus is built on the back of ESPN’s already robust ubiquity on PCs, tablets, and the ESPN Plus app on smartphones. ESPN Plus is now also available on Xbox One and PS4 consoles.
Specifically, you can tune into ESPN Plus in your web browser by on the way to the service’s website (opens in new tab) and sign up for the service.
If you’re more of a mobile sports watcher, download the ESPN app from the Apple App Store or Google Play Store and sign up for the service there. Or, if you like the traditional feel of sitting on the couch to watch the game, ESPN Plus is available on Apple TV, Chromecast, and the Amazon Fire TV platform – and now on the Roku platform as well.
There is no price difference between the platforms and one account can be transferred to the other platforms just by logging in – which is quite handy. Speaking of convenient, because ESPN Plus is linked to your existing ESPN account, you can use the same credentials.
One last thing worth pointing out here, despite its very obvious nature, is that you’ll need internet access to watch ESPN Plus – i.e. even if you decide to cut the cord, you’ll need to still pay your cable company (or ISP) for internet access. If you’re reading this website right now, this is something you’re already paying for – so don’t completely cut off your cable provider if you decide to cut the old cable TV cord.
Can I watch ESPN Plus in 4K and HD?
While you can’t watch ESPN Plus in 4K, the sports streaming service offers content that’s usually available to stream at 60fps 1080p. In other words, Full HD. In some circumstances, depending on the strength of your internet connection, etc., you can expect streams to be downgraded to 720p if necessary.
(opens in new tab)
How do I cancel ESPN Plus?
ESPN Plus is one of the better streaming services for commitment-phobes, especially for the shorter monthly plan.
Since a subscription only lasts for 30 days, all you need to remember is to cancel before it expires – go to the subscription on the ESPN website or app and confirm your cancellation and you can then walk away from ESPN Plus without a hitch.
We really like the flexible nature of this service, which is derived from the likes of Netflix.
It’s a similar procedure for annual subscribers – if you want to opt out of the service, just remember to cancel before your 12 months are up.