- On this page:
- User Experience
- Shows & Sports
- Streaming Quality
- Platform
- Pricing & Cost
- Our Take
Pros and Cons of ESPN Plus
Pros
- Extremely affordable
- Plenty to watch
- Tons of out-of-market NHL games
- UFC pay-per-view events available (at extra cost)
- Great coverage of niche sports
- Solid on-demand library
- Works via regular ESPN app
Cons
- No livestream of ESPN's TV network (except with pay TV login)
- Missing high-profile game broadcasts
- UFC content can be frustratingly costly
How It Felt to Use ESPN Plus
ESPN Plus snuck up on me. I was caught off guard by the quality of some of the programming. NFL Primetime, long gone from ESPN’s cable broadcasts, lives on here — complete with Chris Berman, who hasn’t lost anything off of his “whoop.” Sneaker Center is a delightful little program that covers sneakerhead culture. The 30 for 30 series of documentaries is just as good as I remembered, and awfully easy to watch for hours on end. But I’m getting ahead of myself — let’s go back to the beginning.
Signing up for ESPN Plus is pretty easy. You can just add it to an existing ESPN account, or you can sign up through another method, such as via Roku. If you sign up through Roku or another platform, you can link your ESPN Plus subscription to a new or existing ESPN account.
A word of warning, though: This works a little differently if you sign up for ESPN Plus through Disney’s bundled Hulu, Disney Plus, and ESPN Plus deal. That’s what I did, and I immediately ran into a problem. Hulu had me create a login to use for Disney Plus and ESPN Plus, but that login was mutually exclusive with the one I’ve used for years on ESPN.com. I wasn’t able to link my new ESPN Plus subscription to my existing ESPN account — instead, I had to log out and back in again. All my fantasy football and baseball teams are linked to my ESPN.com account, so this was a real pain for me. On the bright side, this at least spared me from having to see my fantasy football team’s 2020 record (3-4) every time I logged in to watch Korean baseball.
As far as I can tell, this was a problem on Disney’s side. It’s easy to combine an ESPN.com account with an ESPN Plus subscription that you get via Roku, but — oddly — it seems to be impossible to do so with one that you get from Hulu, which is ESPN’s own Disney-owned sibling.
ESPN Plus works within the ESPN app — the same one that existed for years before the ESPN Plus streaming service came out. That was bad news for me, thanks to the dueling logins created by the issue with Disney’s Hulu bundle, but it’s good news for most folks: ESPN’s app is convenient and already works on a lot of devices.
Once I had logged into my ESPN Plus account on the ESPN app, I was prompted to choose my favorite leagues and teams. The app tried to automatically set notifications to “on” for each and every one of the teams I selected, which was a bit annoying but easy enough to fix manually. With that process done, I landed on the home screen.
The ESPN app works pretty hard to get you watching. On mobile, it auto-plays video on the home page. On all platforms, it offers a view of featured programming, live TV, and “Top Picks.”
The ESPN app also houses live video from ESPN’s TV channels, which you can access by logging in with a pay TV provider. Of course, if you’re a cord cutter, you may not have a live TV provider (though streaming options like Sling TV will get you access just like cable). This felt a little obnoxious to me — I was paying for ESPN Plus, and yet the app was showing me what I couldn’t watch unless I paid for ESPN itself. This is a feature that’s very convenient for folks with pay TV credentials, but a little annoying for cord cutters.
Using ESPN Plus in the ESPN app, it was striking to see just how integrated ESPN Plus is with ESPN’s other offerings. But I ultimately found these integrations more annoying than convenient, especially because my Hulu bundle had trapped my ESPN Plus streams in this brand-new account. Frankly, I think I would’ve been happier just downloading a new app or logging into a separate website.
These frustrations aside, ESPN Plus is a pretty well-designed service. The content is sorted logically, and the live events are surfaced in a smart way — if you’re logging in just in time for the kickoff or first pitch of a big game, then you’ll probably see that game front and center on the ESPN Plus app. I also liked the “Browse” tab of the app, which let me quickly sort content by sport or league.
I particularly liked that I could sort by league or sport. When I wanted news about MLB, I could select MLB — but if I was just in the mood to watch baseball, the “baseball” category was able to give me Korea’s KBO league, college baseball, and more. I watched it all, of course (go Dinos).
Though I didn’t use it as often as some other features, I really liked the way the ESPN app included a schedule. By clicking the calendar icon in the web app or flipping to the right tab of the mobile or streaming app, I could access a comprehensive schedule of upcoming events.
I could even sort through the options, checking out what was airing on ESPN Plus or on other ESPN channels — an important distinction, since ESPN Plus does not include a livestream of the ESPN cable channel. The schedule was a good place to find new and exciting things to watch, and it also helped me keep track of my favorite teams — though this is one of several areas where I felt that ESPN Plus could have made better use of my favorite team and league information. It would have been nice if games involving my teams were highlighted in a different color, for example.
With ESPN Plus, it’s easy to find something to watch, and it’s a breeze to flip through live events, replays of past programming, and on-demand content. ESPN Plus makes it simple to “just watch” something, which is perfect for the sort of content it has — which brings us to our next section.
What You Can Watch on ESPN Plus
A streaming service is only as good as what you can watch on it. Fortunately, ESPN Plus has a lot going for it in this department. When ESPN Plus first debuted, a lot of us were disappointed by what it didn’t include — namely, a livestream of ESPN’s cable network. This is still the case: ESPN Plus and ESPN the TV channel are different things. I’m among those who wish that there were some way to get ESPN without paying for cable or a live TV streaming service, but as I tested ESPN Plus again for this latest review I found a lot to like about what the service does include.
So what can you watch on ESPN Plus? The short answer is sports, and lots of 'em. Whenever I logged into the ESPN app, I found live sports and sports news programming to watch. My ESPN Plus subscription gave me access to live games and competitions from all over the world of sports, including everything from college football to — I am not making this part up — international beach soccer, which is exactly what it sounds like. For me, watching lesser-known (and, in some cases, weird or silly) sports was a part of the fun of having ESPN Plus. In no time at all, I had an unhealthy emotional investment in the outcome of international beach soccer matches. Aren’t sports wonderful?
On top of all of this live content, ESPN Plus gave me access to a pretty robust catalog of on-demand content, including previously aired sporting events and news programs as well as movies and TV shows from ESPN and sub-brands like 30 for 30.
If you’re a sports omnivore like me, then you’ll likely love what ESPN Plus has to offer. The selection of sporting events on ESPN Plus is pretty eclectic and tends to be more obscure. For every college football or MLB game on ESPN Plus, there are plenty of less mainstream livestreams: volleyball matches, featherweight boxing, and action from the NBA G League, which is pro basketball's minor league. You’ll even find esports (though I don’t think ESPN Plus’ offerings are going to top Twitch in this department anytime soon).
This wasn’t the end of the world for me. I love sports, and I’m the sort of fan who enjoys the breadth and variety of what ESPN lovingly calls “the wide world of sports.” Baseball is the sport I watch most religiously, but I keep up with all the other big leagues and I love checking out occasional matches in sports I don't normally follow, such as boxing and rugby. If you’re a fan of the NHL, then you may be happy to know ESPN Plus is airing more than 1,000 mostly out-of-market games in the 2021-22 season.
You may find ESPN Plus’ content lacking if you’re a fan of some other sports though. You’ll get only a bit of regular-season MLB action, and no NBA or NFL content at all.
ESPN Plus’ live sports content also includes a lot of UFC, but there are some caveats. An ESPN Plus subscription will get you lots of UFC analysis and news, plus some fights. But the biggest UFC matches are available only as pay-per-view (PPV) events.
Here’s where it gets tricky: ESPN Plus and UFC have an exclusive deal that covers these PPV events. You need to have ESPN Plus to watch them, but they’re not actually included with ESPN Plus. To access a UFC PPV event, you have to first subscribe to ESPN Plus, and then pay for the PPV event.
Still with me? Let’s recap some of the essentials in a handy-dandy chart.
| NFL | NBA | MLB | NHL | UFC | SportsCenter | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Included with ESPN Plus | Some news and analysis | Some news and analysis | Select games, some news and analysis | More than 1,000 mostly out-of-market games, news and analysis | Exclusive events and coverage. Access to Pay-Per-View events (at additional cost) | Replays on demand |
| Not included; pay TV login required | “Monday Night Football“ | “NBA on ESPN” broadcasts | – | – | – | Live broadcast on ESPN |
However highly you think of the sports and games ESPN Plus offers, I think you'll agree on at least this point: There's plenty of them! At just about any hour of day or night, I was able to find something to watch. If you're like me and sometimes just want some live sports content — any kind of live sports content — on your TV screen, then I think you'll get a kick out of ESPN Plus.
I spent most of my ESPN Plus streaming time checking out the live sporting events, but live content isn't all that ESPN Plus has. ESPN Plus also hosts streams of sports news and highlight programs, as well as a whole lot of movies and TV shows related to sports. The lineup includes most entries into ESPN's popular 30 for 30 series (I recommend The Two Escobars) and ESPN Plus originals like Peyton’s Places. Be aware that ESPN sometimes ships its shows elsewhere, though. As of this writing, you can watch “The Last Dance” on Netflix, but not on ESPN Plus.
I found ESPN Plus’ originals surprisingly interesting. I found myself watching a lot of 30 for 30 films that I’d never known existed. I also really enjoyed Detail, a show where Peyton Manning analyzes game film from a quarterback’s perspective. I felt like it made me a more knowledgeable fan.
ESPN Plus Features and Streaming Quality
ESPN Plus streams looked pretty good on my screens. The quality tops out at 720p HD — not mind-blowing stuff, but probably a necessary concession to the demands of streaming live events smoothly. The 60 FPS frame rate kept the movement on my screen looking as smooth as anything I've seen from cable or satellite.
I found ESPN Plus' streams to be pretty reliable, but not perfect — my feed was sometimes interrupted by loading screens. The good news is that these incidents were rare, especially on a wired ethernet connection and mobile devices (for whatever reason, the occasional interruptions seemed to happen most often on my Roku TV). The better news is that these loading screen hiccups were extremely short — the screen would go black for a second and re-load before picking up right where it left off. I presume the video lag was increasing, but I wasn't actually missing any action and I found (somewhat to my surprise) that I didn't really care about such a small issue.
Other than those little streaming hiccups, I didn't notice much of a difference when streaming on different platforms and devices. Things worked pretty well and looked very good on my Roku TV, Chromecast, iPad, Mac, and PC. You can stream ESPN Plus on up to three different devices simultaneously.
By the way, we should talk a little bit about buffering and lag here. With live streaming events like sports, it's important to remember that streamers are on a slight delay relative to their cable-viewing peers. That's because smooth streaming requires a bit of “buffering.” Buffering is just your device getting ahead of the task at hand: It's downloading the data it needs to show the next few seconds of your video so that it can keep streaming smoothly even if your internet connection slows down.
You can probably see where all this is going: Buffering means downloading the next few seconds of a video, but that’s not really something you can do when the next few seconds haven’t happened yet! For live events like sports, the only solution is to run streaming services on a bit of a delay, giving a little cushion for the services to buffer.
All of this means that you should exercise a bit of caution while streaming sports on ESPN Plus — if you check Twitter or read a text from a friend with cable, you might find out about a touchdown or a home run a few seconds before it's actually shown on your screen.
Our review is focused on the streaming video aspects of ESPN Plus, but I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the extra content. ESPN Plus includes special access to premium ESPN content, including exclusive articles and fantasy sports tips. Since ESPN Plus’ streaming features are already built into the regular old ESPN app, it’s pretty easy to hop back and forth between the exclusive articles and video content.
ESPN Plus Platform Support
ESPN Plus works right inside the ESPN app, which is good news for users of most devices. The ESPN app works on every major streaming, mobile, and video game platform, including Roku, Fire TV, Apple's tvOS, Android TV, Samsung Smart TV, iOS, Android (mobile), PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. ESPN Plus will also work in your browser (Firefox and Chrome on all major operating systems, plus Safari on Macs, Microsoft Edge on Windows, and even Opera on Linux).
I found the experience to be pretty consistent across the platforms I tested. I used ESPN Plus with Roku, Fire TV, iOS, and both Chrome and Firefox on both Mac and PC when testing the service for this review.
ESPN Plus Value
ESPN Plus costs $6.99 per month. That's a very affordable; it's comparable to the price of Disney Plus ($7.99 per month) and significantly cheaper than Netflix ($13.99 per month for the most popular of its three subscription tiers).
ESPN Plus can be even cheaper if you’re interested in the other streaming options from ESPN’s parent company, Disney. You can bundle ESPN Plus with Disney Plus and the on-demand version of Hulu for $13.99 per month. That's one of the best deals in the streaming world right now. Just be aware of the ESPN account issue I mentioned in the User Experience section of this review.
As great as ESPN Plus’ pricing is, the service offers only limited coverage of MLB, and no NBA or NFL games. As we talked about in the What You Can Watch section of this ESPN Plus review, the gaps in programming make ESPN Plus a good fit for some sports fans but a poor fit for others. This is bound to affect how you feel about the value ESPN Plus offers.
ESPN Plus sometimes feels like a supplemental sports subscription, but its price makes it easy to add to a monthly budget that already includes NBA League Pass, Sling TV, or, as in my case, an MLB TV subscription. ESPN Plus isn’t pretending to be anything it’s not, and, crucially, it’s not charging high prices as though it’s more than it is. Ultimately, it offers really good value.
ESPN Plus Review: Our Verdict
ESPN Plus is a highly affordable sports streaming service that’s easy to use and has plenty to watch.
Is it the only streaming service a die-hard sports fan will need? In my view, no. There’s never any shortage of sports to stream, but you can’t always count on being able to watch the biggest games of the day. Of North America’s four major sports leagues — MLB, the NBA, the NHL, and the NFL — two (NBA and NFL) have no live games on ESPN Plus. You’ll find MLB games on the service, as well as NCAA football and basketball games, but they won’t necessarily be the biggest and most exciting games on the schedule. ESPN Plus is going all-in on hockey, though, by airing hundreds of regular-season games a year. Still, if you're a fan of the country’s most popular teams, leagues, and sports, then ESPN Plus is unlikely to be your one-stop shop for sports streaming.
ESPN Plus is a supplemental dose of games and analysis for fans of a wide range of sports and events. With ESPN Plus, I never ran out of sports to watch. I could check out historic sports moments in documentaries or view foreign leagues and unique sports events that may not make the rotation on ESPN’s TV channel or on competitor channels such as FS1.
How much you’ll get out of ESPN Plus depends on what sort of sports fan you are. If your sports intake is limited to Sunday’s NFL games and the NBA Finals, you won’t find much to enjoy here. If you’re like me, then you may love ESPN Plus’ reliable supply of diverse sports. It won’t replace your MLB TV subscription or the antenna you use to watch the World Series or NBA Finals, but it will make sure you’re never without sports between the bigger events. It’s always midseason somewhere, and ESPN Plus makes sure you’re there.
Warning – ESPN+ may associate your account with wrong person. I had my financial account associated with a name of someone I do not know. Customer service had no idea what was going on. Too much risk to do business. Proceed with caution as ESPN+ may be insecure.
That’s odd! Thanks for letting us know.
ESPN+ promised a lot and delivered little. College football on replay, no NFL without a cable plan, some basketball, maybe a MLB game but not a prime time game, and not a whole lot of anything live. Might as well keep cable and save your $$$.
I had ESPN Plus through a bundle deal and when I ordered the UFC Event, it charged me for a yearly membership instead. I called four times and was told my refund would be back in my account within ten business days. It never showed up and now they say it has been denied. I don’t recommend ESPN Plus for ANYONE unless you wanna get your hard earned cash taken from you from something you did not agree upon.
That’s pretty much what happened to me, these ESPN+ crooks signed me up on a deal for $49.99 where I could watch my MMA fight, and then for the next year I was supposed to be able to get them anytime I wanted for a discounted price and I didn’t even get to see the one fight I wanted. I called & canceled the next day requesting my money back, and they said fine. It turns out they didn’t refund my money and then a year later charged my account another $49.99 then another year later $59.99! When I finally caught it and reported the fraud to them directly, some Indian woman named Amandeep said I have to call my bank & have them take care of the fraud on that end, they won’t do it from their end, even though it’s THEIR company that committed the fraud?!! WTF?!!
My main problem with ESPN+ is that a good portion of its content is cannibalized from what was (or in the case of MLS, was promised to be) a part of ESPN3 that most of us already pay for.
Just signed up today after finding out ESPN signed an exclusive agreement with Serie A TIM (Italy’s soccer league). I’m really excited about this as I struggled to find a way to watch my beloved AC Milan. Plus now I can watch Ronaldo with Juventus too. At the annual rate of $49.99 this new add on is it worth it and some. Nice job ESPN!
Times have changes. Serie A is now on Paramount +; Ronaldo left Juve for ManU
ESPN + – very Disappointed in ESPN +,
Tried to watch Stetson Football vs. Marist today on 9/22/18, but there was technical difficulty. I will be telling this story in the office for a long time (probably for ever). My story goes like this… Signed up for ESPN + to watch my son play football 850 miles away and paid a monthly subscription, only to find out when I attempted to veiw the game – TECHNICAL DIFFICULTY, PLEASE STAND BY…. Stand by for the entire game… I already shared this with just about everyone i ran into during the 3 hr game.
Warning if you subscribe through Apple, or Amazon, you cannot watch unless using that device. I subscribed initially through Amazon, but my IOS devices wouldn’t support it. Cancelled and signed up VIA Apple now my Firestick wont support it. It’s BS, I miss more of the fights than I see trying to get access.
Its a joke. Doesn’t work on any device but the computer. The only college football games you get are teams you’ve never heard of, no big name games. And Customer Support is terrible! They don’t even know how to troubleshoot their own app!
Only way to watch UFC now. Lots of start stop streaming. Terrible search engine. Only game in town.
I subscribed and it sucks the majority of the good shows are blocked out, it’s just a waste of money.
Do not get ESPN+ I have a brand new Samsung smart TV and had so much trouble trying to watch a fight that I paid 70 plus dollars for I called the ESPN+ they asked me to do a couple things to the TV which were not helpful so I asked for a refund after the person on the phone said my TV wasnt compatible. they said they would refund me my money after 5 to 7 business days I’ve called 6 times and it’s been 2 months and I still haven’t received my money
Worst experience for the last three UFC events. I had to call support for each event and was only able to watch the first two events on my cell phone. I give up on chromecast (which works with every other app i have ever tried no problem) and bought a Roku to directly download the app to the TV I intend to watch it on. I purchased the fight two days prior to fight night on my iphone. Tech suggested that I request a refund from purchasing UFC 244 on my iphone and then repurchase the fights on a PC so it would show on all devices linked to my account. I done as he suggested (what a hassle this was, another waiting call with apple pay). The fights still did not sync across my devices. This is the worst experience ever for streaming any event. The support sucks and even with sending them screen shots of my bank account for verification of purchase they suggest to ask for a refund and purchase again on a different device. I should get all events free for a year for my troubles. It has made one of our favorite things to do such a hassle it isn’t worth it anymore. I will be looking for another options purchase the fights and cancel all this ESPN hoop jumping. When you do get it to work you have to change stations between the early prelims, the prelims, and the main event or you will miss them. Be aware of this or miss fights. The worst marketing ever. I wish i could give negative stars.
So what I gather is the ESPN+ does not show the same content that is currently on at same time on the ESPN networks?
Generally, yes, that’s right!
ESPN+ is NOT for cord cutters. In order to view any popular ESPN content you’ll need a cable/satellite subscription. ESPN+ is basically an add-on, in case the ESPN channels you are paying for don’t offer you enough content. If you’re really into soccer, obscure college teams, or other random sports that don’t get broadcast on the normal ESPN channels and sports packages this may be for you.
It does have some good on demand content, but if you’re not a super fan of the fore-mentioned sports it’s just not worth paying for. I will be canceling my subscription.
Adding the ability to stream live content, SportsCenter, and/or NFL MNF (even for a slight cost increase) could definitely change my mind.
Right, and I agree with the author of the article about that: It’s obnoxious for cord cutters.
I have loved ESPN+ until last month. Last month they billed me an extra $50.00. I have been working on getting that money back for 44 days. They just keep pushing the date out. Each time I call they say it is approved and will be 5 to 10 more business days. Today was supposed to be the lastest date that was guaranteed, now I am being told I need to wait 5 more days.
I will no longer use them for watching sports. I would rather pay more per month then work with this company.
I would give them negative stars after this whole experience.
Update: talked to ESPN+ again today, now they say they are reviewing the payment again. Even though it has been guaranteed numerous times. Filed a complaint with the FCA
ESPN+ sucks. I thought there would be some NFL games on there since I can not get espn. I signed up to get it monthly and they charged me for a year. I guess I am stuck with this crap for a year. I am very disappointed with it.
ESPN+ is garbage!!! U can only watch things that isn’t broadcasting on espn and you have to have a cable subscription to watch anything that matters! So disappointed wish I would have read the reviews before I purchased because I haven’t seen a good review yet!!!
Yep, I cancelled a day after signing up, could NEVER access espn+, no matter how hard I tried, how many calls I made, how many ‘professionals’ I called, just not available to my Samsung Smart tv at all, fini.
Only sign up for espn+ if you enjoy watching blurry sports that stop to buffer every ten seconds. What a rip off.
Don’t plan on watching your favorite NHL team. So far every time the Penguins were on they were blacked out for me. I am in USA and the they are playing in Calgary tonight and it’s still blacked out! How ridiculous is that!
Way too many issues. Batting 500 is great if you are talking about baseball, but getting it right about half the time is unacceptable for sports programming.
I read some reviews on ESPN plus, which were very wordy and I think misleading about what ESPN plus is actually offering. So, I signed up for a month $5.40 expecting at least
a couple live college bowl games but sadly, not included. I should have known. The only way to watch college bowl games live is to buy a subscription to ESPN, but not ESPN plus, through a cable provider . So beware if you think this will get you live broadcast of college football, it will not.
Not worth the money (and I’m bundled with Disney+ and Hulu). Honestly this streaming service wouldn’t survive if not bundled with Hulu and Disney+. Who would pay $5 a month for nothing? And when I say nothing I literally mean nothing, it doesn’t play anything meaningful live. Not a true chord cutting option to stay up-to-date with sports. Too bad they haven’t figured out how much a corner market they’d have if they made a streaming service that delivered value. Wouldn’t mind seeing someone beat them to the punch here.
ESPN+ sucks. I want my money back. Like immediately.
Trying to watch Big 12 Men’s basketball on the app. I have a Samsung smart tv. Action freezes, audio disappears when the games change. Have to constantly reload the app during a game. This is the only way to watch many of the big 12 games. I don’t mind paying for it but it would be great if I could actually WATCH it on the TV! I chatted with customer support….only solution was to remove and reload the app. There has to be another solution. BIG 12 I hope you are listening!
Is it just my tv, but when I watch the Big 12 now basketball it looks fuzzy. The commercial breaks are clear but the game looks terrible
FYI, signed up last week so I could watch the fight. I ended up watching it on my PC because it would not link to either of my Samsung Smart TV’s. I called Samsung this morning to find out neither of my TV’s are compatible. The TV has to be newer than 2017.
The tech also told me the only Samsung TV’s that are compatible will have the letter M,N, R or Q as the 5th letter so if you have a Samsung and are thinking of getting it check your model number first. Pretty deceitful of ESPN to not list that it has to be a newer Samsung Smart TV. I will be able to screen share from my cell phone but anytime you get a call etc. it interrupts it. I will not renew next year, unfortunately its the only way I know to view UFC in your home.
ESPN+ is the only app on my smart TV that barely works. They over promise and under deliver. $5/mo and you still don’t have access to most ESPN shows and content. I fell for it.
Espn app is terrible does not work when you need it for big events. Extremely disappointed should be better and they need to invest a large amount of money to get this app where it need to be. 0 star rating.
ESPN plus disappointed me day one. Just bought it and the ufc fight last saturday, with two fights left the app went black couldn’t watch the last 2 fights!! So I guess for the unforeseen future I don’t get to watch any ufc fights at my house. I had to call 3 times and after 2 hours got a refund but I would much rather be able to watch all the fights!! Hopefully comcast finds away to broadcast fights again!!
We love watching sports. Many of the sports we watch are now on ESPN Plus. Every fight, every device every game has taken us a lot of time and frustration to watch. We have missed many fights because of issues getting it to work. Finally figured out how to watch the KU game on my TV, can’t through Dish, and it is already to the first half and buffering. It really sucks when there is no recourse to watch the sports you want to. They have a lot of work to do.
ESPN+ swindled me again. I was browsing through ESPN app, trying to watch AO men’s singles semifinal tennis match. There was a free feed (ESPN3), but it was the multi-angle version that looks distracting. Then I see a live event at the venue where the match was being played, and it’s marked ESPN+, meaning if I sign up for ESPN+, I will get to see that match full screen. I signed up, open that live feed, but the event is not there. Instead there is a screen that says “your event will start soon”, and the event never started. Meanwhile the match took place on time in the ESPN3 feed. So I paid $4.99 for nothing. Similar thing happened to me in November, but at that time they were good about issuing a refund, to their credit.
In short, ESPN+ will sometimes deceive you. The bad part is, you are not likely to make a big stink about $5 and spend all that time and energy. Who’s the sucker here and who’s the Cartman?
This ap is terrible! My son wrestles at Harvard and the last two matches we wanted to watch live, there were technical difficulties! So frustrating!!!!
For a big communication company they have no idea how to run an online streaming service. You will be lucky if you can ever get it to work.
Ive been waiting all morning for an activation code and already missed the game I wanted to watch. Very disappointing
no MLB (replays or live) without a cable subscription or MLB subscription. good thing it was only 50 bucks or i would be way more pissed off.
they need to advertise this on the front page of their website.
this is straight from the support chat.
.” ESPN+ will not include streaming of ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNews or ESPN Classic, or the sports broadcast on those channels – like live NFL, NBA, MLB and college games. That still requires an existing cable, satellite or over-the-top subscription (from Sling TV, DirecTV Now or similar services).”
espn+ is not worth paying anything for they give you absolutely nothing. Don’t waste your time
I totally agree that ESPN+ is totally worthless. You are required to go to the ESPN app select ESPN+ and then filter through hundreds of things you can’t watch without cable subscriptions. You then discover precious little to actually watch using ESPN+.
No NFL, NBA, NCAA Basketball live broadcasts and not even the availability to watch games the next day on delayed streaming.
I bought a month to see what I could get and blew six bucks.
It depends on what you’re in to sports-wise as to whether or not you’ll actually like ESPN+. I love baseball, football, basketball, NCAAF, all men’s. 2nd tier sports are things like World’s Strongest Man competitions, NCAA men’s bball, March Madness, alma mater sports, girl’s softball, gymnastics.
Things I don’t like. MMA/UFC. Can’t stand it. Disgusting plebian gladiator entertainment that for about 3 years was good, but then turned into boring wrestling matches. Peyton Manning talking. Unfortunately, ESPN+ is Peyton Manning talking and MMA, and that’s it. You get old docs that are out of date now. You get Kobe “rapist” Bryant analyzing games. If that’s your thing, you’ll love espn+. I don’t.
“Exclusive Content” is now being aired on ESPN for non ESPN plus subscribers. I called today to ask for a discount, refund, or anything since it was no longer “exclusive content” I get there’s no live sports to broadcast but why should I be double dipped? I also let them know I buy every UFC fight and spend a lot of money through Hulu Disney plus as well. They didn’t care. Typical Disney company. Told me to contact a third party for discount, I asked who that would be. Was told ask google, amazon or Apple. Like WTF
I paid almost $4.00 for a year subscription (eBay) and I’m still pissed off! Four dollars a year is too much for this crap. Ther’s nothing worth it if you don’t have cable!
Before I bought this PPV fight (and the subscription to ESPN+) I had read the multitude of 1 star ratings for the app and thought that surely it couldn’t be that bad.
It is.
I have no TV provider, I have no internet at home. I was hoping to watch it via my laptop. No deal… to do that, one has to sign in with either an ISP or TV provider. So, now I’m stuck watching this on my phone. OK, go out and purchase the thickest pair of “reader” glasses I could find and watch it with my phone about 6 inches from my face… problem solved.
Nope.
Immediately it starts to freeze periodically. That”periodically” in reality is that every 10 to 20 seconds the frame freezes, the rotating circle appears for anywhere between 2 seconds and over a minute.
I must note here that I am not missing any of the action, albeit the action pauses constantly, but it picks right up where it left off. (The picture quality fluctuated between crystal clear – sometimes – to blurry – most of the time)
So for each minute or so of “live” streaming – which is what I paid for, my feed is starting to lag, such that in short order I’m not watching a live event, but one that became increasingly delayed.
Towards the end of the main event, I accidentally let my phone slip and left the event that I was watching. I immediately reloaded the page only to get the message that the event had ended! Apparently, it was approximately 40 minutes earlier, judging by the times of the comments posted on the web. For reference I was still watching at 2:40am (EST USA)
I will be disputing this charge with my credit card company to attempt to get a refund. IANAL but if I paid for “live” streaming and didn’t receive it, perhaps – but probably not knowing how these things usually go – I might have a case.
Surely I’m not the only one to be extremely dissatisfied. How does a company continue to run and app that is universally vilified, not address the situation knowing that repeat customers for their platform must be leaving in droves…
I am back here 2 years later and the ESPN+ app is still garbage. Some UFC events can’t even be watched. Hope the UFC got paid for this because their fans can barely watch the events.
I am extremely disappointed in espn. You would think if you paid for an espn+ subscription, that in the ap under the (espn+) tab you should be able to click and watch everything advertized under said tab. But everything you click on besides ufc stuff sends you to a page to log in with your cable provider. Hell i should have just stayed with my cable company. If i can’t watch it with my espn+ subscription, get it out of the possibilities under the damn espn+ tab.
I had to activate 8 times today. I had to reinstall the ap today. I had to reauthenticate account twice. I missed half of the first quarter. I spoke with customer service reps who thought it was funny, thought I was confused and had NO IDEA WHAT THEY WERE DOING. If this was the first time this had happened I would say they’ve had a bad day, but this is continuously happening, just about every single time. I would rather have to sign in every time instead of a malfunctioning all the time. If I wasn’t a fan I would not let them pull me by the short hairs.
NOT WORTH IT!! ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO WATCH!!
ESPN + has no concept of customer loyalty. It seems as though they would rather nickel and dime you out of an inappropriate charge than work with you so you continue to spend money with them and use their service. They won’t even prorate a cancelled erroneous duplicate subscription after 1 month. Such a shortsighted goal without any emphasis on customer service. I find this odd as Disney is the parent company and supposedly figured out how to customer service and loyalty over 50 years ago.
Sorry, very long comment, but the bottom line is Don’t pay for ESPN+. Their billing system has bugs and it takes months to resolve billing issues. The company seems like they’re turning into a very dishonest company that doesn’t want to do the fair thing for their customers.
Unfortunately I signed up for an annual ESPN+ subscription in August of 2019.
After a month I noticed that they had charged me twice for the annual plan. I called the customer service, and they were very nice and said they would refund me one of the charges. A couple months went by, and no refund. I had to call back multiple times and spend hours on the phone, and around December they finally refunded me.
When they refunded me the duplicate charge, somehow my access to ESPN+ was discontinued. Again, hours on the phone with customer service, and they said they would just refund me a pro-rated portion of the initial charge also, because the refunding of the duplicate charge turned off my service, and they couldn’t figure out how to turn it on. They suggested if I wanted ESPN+, that I should switch to month-to-month service. So, at this point I didn’t have an ESPN+ subscription which was fine with me.
A month ago on September 2020, I received an email from ESPN+ that ‘they wanted me back’ and were offering 20% discount on their annual plan to join (39.99/yr as opposed to 49.99/yr). Stupidly, I joined again. The first charge went through in September for 39.99 and things seemed good. But then I noticed I was again charged by ESPN+ in October, for the the full price 49.99. So double charged again.
Again spent hours on the phone with customer service, and they’re unwilling to refund me the 49.99, and honor the 39.99 price. They say they can only refund me the 39.99, and that the 49.99 was an auto-renew from last year, and that I would have to pay the 49.99.
My plan was cancelled last year so it should not have auto-renewed, and on their website it says if you cancel your plan you also cancel the auto renewal. That’s pretty standard for all subscriptions.
For some reason the supervisor couldn’t or wouldn’t understand that concept that I shouldn’t be auto-renewed if my original plan was cancelled. Their billing system definitely has a bug that they’re unwilling to acknowledge.
Granted it’s only a difference of $10, but the company seems to be turning into a very dishonest company and basically cheating their customers. They are refusing to do the the fair thing for me, and just honor the 39.99 promo price they sent to me through email.
This can probably happen to you as well if you sign-up, so just stay away. Don’t give your money to ESPN as they will probably cheat you too.
Support companies that treat their customers fairly.
ESPN plus has no pluses. It is absolutely awful and in no way adds any value to any bundle. I get it through my phone plan along with the base HULU plan and Disney. HULU is useless without live TV and Disney is hit or miss. Of the three Disney is likely the app that you will use the most, albeit very little if you are like me. If you are viewing the Disney/Hulu/ESPN plus bundle as a way to cut the cord and save some money over cable you would be well served to skip this bundle as it brings nothing worthwhile to the table. Granted, you can watch some movies or shows on Disney. No live TV with Hulu unless you subscribe to their live TV programming which, they just raised the price for again. Do yourself a favor, find another service or keep your cable.
Exactly. I subscribe to Hulu and Disney+ and just dropped ESPN+. Not even worth the extra $1 a month for the bundle that includes ESPN+. Absolutely worthless.
Espn sucks…..trying to watch a basketball game and they have 2 or three guys on the tv showing them and tallking about football or what they had for supper …..WTF…..how bout just stop trying to show ballgames and just have a talk show…let someone that wants to show the ballgames show them…
Waste of money!!! I got it for my husband because I assumed because it was hyped way up on what it offered that he would be able to watch football with it. Well unless its some obscure game you don’t care about then you get nothing what’s the point of it if you can’t watch live games that actually matter. Espn is shitty and honestly if I didn’t have a bundle I would just cancel it. Thank god we arent paying a whole lot for it!
100% agreed: ESPN+ is worthless. I’ve had the same crap experience. I tried to get a refund after finding out how worthless ESPN+ is (no sportscenter, NFL,NBA,MLB, Top College sports) … and no refunds … or free trials…because people would quickly find out how limited it is. Only decent content is 30-for-30…which is good but not worth the subscription price. Argh ! Completely unhappy with ESPN (and parent DISNEY) as a company
Ditto here. I just subscribed and unsubscribed all within an hour. They lead you on making you think you can watch the live college games…and sure, you can, *IF* you already have a TV Provider for cable, satellite, etc.,. What the heck, I’d be watching on my provider if I had one of those.
It is a pure rip-off and they know it!
ESPN+ is worthless if you want to watch NBA, NFL, MLB, Top-College sports, SportsCenter. It’s great if all you want to watch is 30-for-30 and obscure college sports (e.g. no top conferences or bowl games), and again no sports center. Wish I would have read this article before signing up. That’s on me. Horrible customer service as well. I paid for a year — signed up to watch MNF and quickly found out MNF is NOT supported on ESPN +. I called and immediately asked for a refund within 10minutes of signing up. NO REFUNDS. NO FREE TRIALS … and they kept me on hold (in chat) for an hour …because if people tried it …no one would sign up. Extremely disappointed and out $50 for year subscription. * Buyer beware *. Hoping someone starts a class action against them for mis-representation as I don’t feel their website accurately depicts what ESPN + provides.
ESPN+ sux.
They make out like you’ll be able to watch all kinds of college games….yeah, if you have a pre-existing TV Provider which if you do what the hell do you need ESPN+ for watching them.
100% accurate comment
This was a really really really long article. The short answer is ESPN+ is absolutely worthless. It’s like paying to have the Amazon app on your phone.
Today I just canceled Disney Plus bundle after 3 plus years as a subscriber. I have had a very bad experience with ESPN that showed Disney is quite untrustworthy and does not fulfill commitments even if you pay for their service. I was denied access to a soccer match on ESPN despite having paid all this time for the service. Worse, I was told I did not have authorization to access the service. All I can say is, be very careful with any Disney service – like ESPN Plus. They are quick to take your money. But equally quick to deny service even when you pay them!
An incredible POS app. Doesn’t stream well on either of my expensive TVs with a gig wireless connection. I can only stream on my computer that is ethernet connected. They have ruined PPV UFC for me. Thanks, jackholes!
Still garbage.
The ads are longer than the highlights. What a horrible pos this app is.
This review completely missed the functionality issues with ESPN+ streaming. The app begins the events LIVE. If you are 1 hour after the start of the event, then you could see the score of the event on the screen. You have to scroll bar back to the beginning to truly get to the start the event. Other sports apps like NBA, MLB and the old NHL would give the option to start from beginning, go live or resume if you had already started watching.
Also, if you leave the app, then upon your return, it knows nothing of where you left off. Start Live and back pedal to where you where.
These missing functions are common in almost all streaming apps, so it’s surprising that ESPN, the so-called leader in sports doesn’t have them.
ESPN+ for hockey is hot garbage…proudly saying 1000+ out of market games which for me boils down to 10 games of the team I root for..until they copy the old nhl.tv options, I’m staying clear of this.
Your app sucks, I haven’t been able to watch one NHL game. I hate sports apps
Seems like I’m the only one who has had good outcome with ESPN+. My only problem was trying to get away from cable or satellite and finding you can only view ESPN system programs if you have paid service. Other than that, my reception and service has been great.
I resent having to subscribe to ESPN+ just to see some parts of the Australian Open 2022.
Worse, the picture resolution of ESPN+ is unacceptable on a large screen tv- in this case an 85″ Samsung QLED. Sunday night’s matches were crystal clear on ESPN and ESPN2, but Monday night’s switch to ESPN+ is a blur.
Agreed! All of the Australian Open used to be available on ESPN and ESPN2. I found the resolution on ESPN+ genuinely poor quality and never sharp. When watching tennis that blurriness affects seeing the lines as well as the overall experience.
I just subscribed to ESPN+ so I could see some of the tennis matches that used to be shown on regular ESPN. I noticed the resolution was inferior to matches shown on regular ESPN streaming. I searched online and came up with this article where you say:
“The quality tops out at 720p HD — not mind-blowing stuff, but probably a necessary concession to the demands of streaming live events smoothly.” What an apologist remark that is. First of all surely there are many, many more views happening on the main events on regular ESPN streaming than this niche ESPN+. On regular ESPN streaming for the same tennis tournament I can always get 1280P. I actually get 1920×1080 on many streams outside of ESPN. So why am I playing extra for this low resolution?
Don’t waste your time or money. 2 golf tourneys in a row, ESPN Plus dropped coverage before the tourney ended. SO frustrating!!!
If you love regular-season NHL games this is for you. I cancel as soon as the season ends.No playoff games.
It’s garbage and not worth it. All the good games are on regular ESPN. The bundles including ESPN “plus” are worthless. They should change the name to ESPN “minus.”
Who ESPN paid you for this article? The quarter of picture sucks and the program keeps buffering. You would think after so many years they would at least attempt to fix the problem.
I have used it for several years. I particularly like to watch CFL games that I otherwise wouldn’t be able to watch. However, the product this year has been GOD-AWFUL. Numerous games didn’t work technically at all. The customer service was completely clueless and the games weren’t fixed and reposted, but eventually simply taken down. I don’t know if ESPN+ has been outsourced technically to some cheap third-party provider abroad, but it’s absolutely PATHETIC. It currently lists two games for Ottawa on the same night!!!! (The two games are supposed to be a week apart!) It’s amazing that some idiot at ESPN+ didn’t catch this!!!! It’s amazing how nobody cares about providing a good product at ESPN+!!! (Of course, it’s not particularly surprising because ESPN itself sucks to high heaven!!!) Of course, they raised the price for ESPN+ recently, too which, of course, makes PERFECT SENSE (sarcasm) since the product gets worse and worse and worse!!!