- I've been feeling a little guilty.
Over the last year or so, I've kind of neglected Sling TV.
I haven't been watching it all that closely.
And so I thought now would be a good time
to take another look at it
since over the last year things have changed a little bit.
Of course, they also look very much the same, right?
Sling is still Sling, Orange and Blue, and all that stuff.
But, yeah, now would be a good time to take another look.
Is Sling TV worth the price,
or is it worth it to go
with one of the more expensive cable replacements
or maybe one of the free ones?
We'll talk about all that today.
We'll go over what it cost,
what kind of channels you can expect from it,
the DVR situation,
and how it stacks up against its competition.
So, Sling TV, let's dive in.
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First things first, let's talk about cost.
That is usually the first thing that we're gonna ask,
is what's gonna cost me to get a service like Sling?
Well, the price did go up in January of this year.
And so the price now
for either the Orange or the Blue package
is gonna be $35 a month.
If you go for the Orange + Blue package,
then you do get a discount there:
$50 for both instead of 70.
There are a few things you can add onto that price,
but for now let's just focus on the DVR.
There is a $5 DVR add-on that you can do optionally.
You can also go with the free DVR,
but more about that in just a moment.
Bottom line is that for base price at least,
if you wanna get the full suite of Sling channels,
it will cost you 50 bucks,
which is less than what you would pay
over on YouTube TV or Hulu Live,
both of which go for $65 a month to start.
As for the channels you get,
this is a much tougher part to review
because some people care about certain channels
and other people don't,
or they care about different channels, whatever.
Anyway, Sling builds it this way.
If you go with the Blue package,
you're getting a better news and entertainment situation.
If you go with Orange, then that's more for sports.
So how accurate is this?
Well, it's pretty accurate, I guess, as far as it goes.
Over on the Blue, like I said, news and entertainment,
they do have all three cable news networks,
so Fox News, MSNBC, and CNN.
And outside of news, they do have a few networks
that you won't find on the Orange package.
And Blue carries local Fox and NBC affiliates
in some markets.
Not mine, unfortunately.
Now, Orange, they say, is for sports, which makes sense
because they have the ESPN Networks over on the Orange side.
Now, the Blue side, I should go back and say
that the Blue side does have Fox Sports,
and so they kind of split those two, right?
So you can get sports on the Blue,
and you can get news on the Orange as well.
CNN is on the Orange network,
just not the other two cable news networks.
So is it a clean divide:
Orange for sports and Blue for news?
No, it's not,
but they're just kind of trying to give you a guideline
to say if you're more into this, then go this direction.
Now, once you pop into Sling TV,
you'll see the channel guide here.
There's a few other menus,
but let's look at the channel guide.
One thing that might be confusing
is why aren't these channels combined in the channel guide?
If you flip through,
it will tell you Sling Blue starts here,
and then it will list all of the channels.
Then when you get down to Sling Orange,
it's going to repeat a bunch of those channels
that are shared between the two services.
Why is that?
Well, I think it's because with the Blue networks,
you can get three simultaneous streams.
That's another difference between the two packages.
So with Orange,
you can only have one simultaneous stream going.
So if you sign up and share your password with a friend,
or if you have two TVs in the house,
you can't be watching more than one stream of, say, ESPN,
but you could be watching three simultaneous streams
of a Fox Sports Network.
In addition to the live TV channels
that you get in the guide,
they also have some on demand content
that you can flip through as well,
but it is a pretty decent on demand library,
and you can also go into the rental section.
So Sling TV isn't just about replacing your cable
with those live TV channels.
They do give you a few other things
that you can do on here as well.
Not bad.
Now let's talk about the DVR situation.
You're gonna find the DVR in the MY TV section of Sling TV,
and here's how it works.
Now, the DVR went up in January along with the price,
but in this case it was a good thing.
It used to be that you could get 10 hours of DVR recording
for free with 50 hours for an additional $5.
Now, that $5 gets you quite a bit more.
Now, with the free DVR, you get 50 hours.
And if you pay that five bucks, you're gonna get 200 hours.
Now, that brings it more in line with Hulu Live's DVR,
but they both still lag behind YouTube TV,
which, yeah, it's got the best DVR
in the business right now.
Speaking of Hulu Live and YouTube TV,
let's talk about how Sling fairs against the competition.
So like I said earlier,
the base price is going to be better on Sling
even when you combine the Orange and Blue packages,
so you don't have to pay quite as much.
And if you opt for just one, Orange or Blue,
then, yeah, you can really bring that price down
to 35 bucks a month,
a lot cheaper than the 65 you would pay
for one of the other two.
But as they say, you get what you pay for,
so you're gonna get a much lower channel count on Sling
than you do on the others,
about half the channels.
So even if you get those combined packages,
Orange Plus Blue,
you're only getting about half the channels
that you would on the other services.
Now, some people might find that frustrating.
Others might find it liberating.
Who cares? I don't watch that many channels anyway.
I just need this or that or the other, and I'm happy.
But, hey, that's up to you.
Now, that is against the other paid providers,
Hulu Live and YouTube TV,
but what about free providers like Pluto or STIRR?
Something like that.
Well, this is pretty interesting
because if we go back to the Sling Guide, the channel guide,
then you go all the way to the bottom,
you're actually gonna find a bevy of additional channels
that they don't really advertise on their website,
and these are the channels, the free channels,
that you would get with something like Pluto.
So Sling is using those
to kind of fill out its channel lineup.
I thought that was pretty interesting to see.
It kind of honestly speaks to the quality
of those free services like Pluto or STIRR or what have you.
But what's our conclusion here?
Well, as a total cable replacement, it's good,
but it's not as good as what you would get
with its competitors: Hulu Live, YouTube TV, or Fubo.
Those are all better as far as pure cable replacements,
getting all of the stuff
that you're used to get with cable or satellite.
So, yes, Sling is maybe not quite as good as those others,
but it is still good, and it is a cheaper way to go.
So if you're really only in it for one or two channels,
you know, say you really wanna get
ESPN or Fox Sports, or both,
then this is gonna be a cheaper way to do that.
If you're going for just a ton of channels,
yeah, maybe not so much.
But if you're laser-focused
and you know exactly what you want, and it's here on Sling,
then, especially with the addition of the new DVR
where you get 200 hours,
it's a lot more attractive than maybe the other two
because, yeah, you can get it for cheaper.
However, if you're looking for a cable replacement
because you just want the TV noise in your house,
you want some entertainment,
you wanna be able to channel-surf a little bit,
then I might recommend
looking at some of those free services that I mentioned.
In fact, I just did a review of Pluto TV.
I really, really liked it, and it's all free.
Really, what I think is that with live TV generally,
with these paid services,
it's really just about the sports, at least for me.
For you, maybe it's about the news.
But with a lot of these other networks
that you find on Sling,
you're gonna get these in other places for even cheaper.
You may not get live feeds the same way you do here,
but if you're looking for AMC,
you can go sign up for AMC Plus.
If you're looking for the Food Network or TLC,
something like that,
go sign up for Discovery Plus for five bucks a month.
But if it's about having access
to the ESPN channel, the live channel,
then, yeah, this is gonna be a good way for you to go.
Anyway, that's my take. Tell me what you think.
If you're a heavy Sling user,
I'm interested to hear what your experience has been
over the last year.
If you feel like it's gotten better or worse,
or if you're thinking about signing up,
tell me what you like and don't like about it.
If you have any other questions,
hit those comments, let me know,
and we can hash it out down there.
So thanks for watching, everybody.
Don't forget to like and subscribe,
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