hey what's going on today i'm about to update the sling tv review
on my website but first i wanted to share with you how i'm planning to start it here it goes
sling tv does not have the best channel lineup cloud dvr or user experience compared to other
live tv streaming services but it does have one main competitive advantage a low starting price
at this point i've tested sling tv more than any other live tv streaming service and after all it
was the original launching in 2015 the company as you may know is owned by dish so why then if
you watch my channel do you hear me talking about youtube tv and how it's the number one pick for
people who want a true cable tv replacement and that's because sling tv is a lot more complicated
but since you can save a lot of money with them i thought it was time to uncomplicate sling tv and
address the three main reasons why people just don't like sling let's get into it number one
channel lineups the first complaint about sling tv has to do with its plans and that's because sling
tv has two skinny bundles instead of services like youtube tv which has one bigger bundle the base
plans are called sling orange and sling blue both plans start at 35 bucks a month each but you can
combine the plans and get sling orange plus blue for a discounted price of 50 a month so stick with
me as we explore the differences between slaying orange and sling blue sling orange has only about
30 channels it is the cheapest way to get espn without cable and features a few other disneyo
networks like disney channel and freeform this plan also includes warner media networks cnn tbs
and tnt but to me this plan is really about espn because cnn tbs and tnt are also included in the
sling blue plan so why don't we talk more about that one sling blue has more than 40 channels
this plan does not include espn but it does have nfl network as i mentioned you get tbs and tnt
which carry some sports too for news cnn fox news and msnbc they're all included this plan has nbc
universal networks like bravo and usa those are not in sling orange you'll also find discovery on
networks like discovery channel food network hgtv id and tlc now sling orange does not carry any
local channels but sling blue has fox and nbc in cities where there are owned and operated stations
mostly larger markets so that means you really need to pair sling tv with an antenna to get all
of your locals two questions i get often first why does sling tv have two base plans and second
why doesn't sling tv have all my locals and the answer to both questions is the same it's the
price disney owned espn is very expensive for live tv streaming services to carry but by having two
base plans sling tv is able to offer customers more options option one get a plan with espn and
a couple dozen other channels with sling orange option two don't pay for espn and get a better
variety of news sports and entertainment networks with sling blue and option three pay more to get
both sling orange and blue let's say you wanted all the combined plans sling orange plus sling
blue at the time of this recording that'll cost you 50 a month still 15 bucks cheaper than youtube
tv's starting price but if sling tv added locals that many people can get free with an antenna
everything would have to change here just look here at the broadcast tv fee on a cable tv bill
that's how much locals cost through a paid tv provider so if sling tv added locals all across
the country it would probably have to raise the starting price by about 15 a month so when people
tell me they'd sign up for sling tv if it had more channels or all their locals i send them over to
youtube tv because that's what youtube tv offers you just gotta pay for it here's the bottom line
sling tv's channel lineups are more complicated because they give you more options to save money
by paying for less of the channels that you don't want or in the case of locals channels that you
can get free using an antenna here's a resource that i've shared on my channel before it's sling
tv service optimizer tool enter all of your must have channels and it's going to recommend the best
plan as well as maybe some add-on channel packages i'll drop a link to this tool in the description
below if you want to check it out number two multiple streams sling tv's rules for multiple
streams adds to the confusion something else that i hear about from time to time but i think i can
clear this up as well with the sling orange plan you get a single stream that means you can play
sling tv on one supported device at a time whether that's your living room tv phone or a computer
remember espn is the main draw of the sling orange plan so you could have espn playing
on your living room tv but you can't have disney channel on the basement tv both channels are in
sling orange and only one stream is allowed at a time sling blue works differently and allows for
three streams at a time so if you have that service you could be watching on your tv phone
or computer at the same time and any combination of supported devices will work for example you
could be streaming nfl network on the living room tv bravo on the bedroom tv and cartoon network on
the basement tv that's because all three networks are in sling blue and it's a three stream service
now if you combine sling orange and blue you can get up to four simultaneous streams one stream is
allowed for sling orange channels and up to three streams first thing blue channels so you could
never have espn on two devices because it's only insulin orange one stream hope that explanation
made sense if it didn't leave a comment below and i'll try to answer your questions
let's move on and moving on to number three dvr the third main thing that people don't like
about sling tv is its dvr now the complaints that i've heard are not really about the functionality
more so the storage space sling tv offers 50 hours of cloud dvr storage in the base plan
but you can upgrade to 200 hours for an additional five dollars a month recordings don't expire
this is actually an improvement because previously sling tv offered only 10 hours of dvr storage
with the base plan and i can remember back when sling tv didn't offer a free dvr at all sling
tv's current dvr offering is still not great compared to the competition youtube tv really
changed the game as far as cloud dvr it offers unlimited cloud dvr storage with the base plan
and recordings are kept for up to nine months but think about who owns youtube tv
it's google and one of google's businesses is cloud storage so while an unlimited dvr is a big
deal for some streamers it's not like google owned youtube tv had to go out of its way to offer it
other live services including sling are probably thinking a lot more about the cost of that cloud
dvr storage on their end and that's why there are limitations for users while most people may think
they need unlimited dvr they probably don't sling tv's 50 hours of free dvr storage is enough to
record 25 movies 50 dramas or 100 episodes of your favorite sitcom with a limited amount of storage
space you will have to visit the dvr tab every now and then here you can check how much storage space
is remaining and delete recordings to make way for new ones now i've always been able to stick
with sling tv's free dvr and that's mostly because sling tv is just one part of my overall streaming
tv setup during the months when i subscribe to sling tv instead of a more expensive service
like youtube tv i'm saving 30 bucks a month and then i can use about half of those savings to
pay for an on-demand service like netflix and if you subscribe to a few on-demand services
most of us do you may find that you're relying a whole lot less on the dvr than you did maybe five
years ago so if you've got a relatively short list of must-have channels and saving money is
important to you take a good look at sling tv just keep in mind everything we talked about today to
manage your expectations get cash back on all your streaming tv purchases plus groceries and gas too
when you pay with the american express blue cash preferred card you can learn why it's my
number one pick in the description below thanks for watching today and i'll see you next time