SWITCH TO A CHEAPER STREAMING DEVICE
Buy a standalone streaming device Chromecast with Google TV
From £34.99 www.snipca.com/43855
Google’s latest Chromecast dongle lets you turn any television into a smart TV for just £35 – about a tenth of the price of buying a new set – simply by plugging it into an HDMI port. The new device lets you stream shows and films at 1080p HD quality and costs £20 less than the existing Chromecast with Google TV, which supports 4K streaming. It’s otherwise the same size with the same soap-on-a-rope design, and offers the same features. These include a unified home screen that lets you browse all your entertainment in one place; a remote control with dedicated buttons for Netflix, Youtube and Google Assistant voice commands (pictured below); and the ability to ‘cast’ content from your phone or tablet to your TV. You can also create a custom screensaver using pictures from your Google Photos library or images and artwork from sources including NASA, Getty and
Google Arts & Culture.
The HD version of Chromecast with Google TV lets you watch all the main streaming services, including – unlike the 4K model – Now TV, but with the annoying exception of All 4 (you can use the mobile app to cast Channel 4 shows to your big screen). Apps are easy to install from the Google Play Store, either on your TV itself or from any phone, tablet or desktop browser on which you’re signed into your Google account.
Amazon Fire TV Stick 4K Max
£54.99 www.snipca.com/43867
Amazon hasn’t updated its Fire TV Stick range this year, focusing instead on an ‘all-new’ version of its Fire TV Cube (www.snipca.com/43865). This has twice the storage capacity of sticks (16GB compared to 8GB), and lets you connect your set-top box, games console or webcam, to control them hands-free using Alexa. However, at £140 it’s relatively expensive for a streaming device – though sure to be discounted for Black Friday – so instead we recommend the Fire TV Stick 4K Max.
Striking the perfect balance between high-end features and affordability – and likely to be even cheaper in the pre-christmas sales – Amazon’s latest Fire TV Stick supports 4K Ultra HD streaming with and speedy Wi-fi 6 to give you a superb-quality picture and reliable performance. You can watch TV shows and films on all your favourite services – including Now TV, and with buttons on the remote for Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Disney+ (pictured above) – and install more than 10,000 additional apps from the Amazon Appstore. If you don’t have a 4K TV, you can save £25 by buying a Fire TV Stick Lite instead (www. snipca.com/43866), though its remote lacks volume controls and a power button.
Roku Streaming Stick 4K
£49.99 www.snipca.com/43870
Costing £5 less than the Fire TV Stick 4K Max and with similar specifications – though it has ‘long-range’ Wi-fi 5 rather than Wi-fi 6 – the Roku Streaming Stick 4K is a great choice for high-quality streaming that won’t break the bank. It’s even smaller (95x21x11.5mm) and lighter (26g) than Amazon’s device and launched around the same time in October 2021.
When we compared the two in Issue 619 (page 24), we gave Roku the edge because it has a simpler interface with fewer intrusive ads.
The Roku Streaming Stick 4K supports all the main free and paid-for streaming services, and many special-interest ones too, and lets you install more than 4,500 apps from the Roku Store. Rather than tie you to a specific voice assistant, you can use Alexa, Google Assistant or Siri (if you use Apple Homekit) to find and control content, and there are buttons on the remote for Netflix, Apple TV+ and Spotify.
As the device has been available for over a year, we expect to see it discounted in the Black Friday sales, but if your TV is HD rather than 4K you can save a further £20 by choosing a Roku Express (www.snipca.com/43869).
Get a streaming device from your ISP Sky Stream
From £26 per month www.snipca.com/43833
As we explain in our review on page 24, Sky Stream offers a cheaper way to get Sky TV channels than paying for a Sky Q box or Sky Glass television, and it doesn’t require a satellite dish or an engineer to install it. Indeed, you can use Sky Stream with any broadband provider, as long as you get a download speed of at least 10Mbps.
Sky Stream includes just under 200 live channels, a Netflix Basic subscription and access to on-demand shows from Sky
and popular services including Apple TV+, Prime Video, Disney+, BBC iplayer, ITVX and All 4. You can also record content to Sky’s web servers, pause and rewind live TV for up to 25 minutes (pictured below), and fast-forward adverts – for the first 18 months, at least, after which this benefit costs extra.
The device itself costs £20 with an 18-month contract or £39.95 with a rolling, contract-free plan, then from £26 per month with a Sky contract, or £29 without one. See our review to discover whether we think Sky Stream is worth the money.
Virgin Media Stream
Free with broadband plan www.snipca.com/43863
Launched in May, Virgin Media’s Stream device is available for free to new and existing broadband customers – its cheapest internet plan currently costs £26 per month – though you need to pay a one-off activation fee of £35, unless you sign up for a more expensive broadband package (M350 and above).
Unlike Sky and BT’S new offerings, Virgin Media Stream doesn’t include Netflix, but you can subscribe to that service, as well as to BT Sport, Prime Video, Britbox, Sky Cinema and more (though not Now or Apple TV+), through your Virgin Media account. This has the dual benefit of letting you manage all your streaming costs in one place, and earning you a 10-per-cent discount on your entertainment subscriptions, which saves you money on next month’s streaming bill. You can watch UK TV channels without an aerial, as well as on-demand services including iplayer, ITVX, All 4 and Youtube.
The device is more like a 4K streaming stick than Virgin Media’s traditional set-top boxes, but unlike the latter it lacks the ability to pause, record and rewind TV. On the plus side, its tiny size (80x80x16mm) means it doesn’t take up much space, and the voice-control button on its remote (pictured below left) lets you search for shows and films hands-free.
BT TV Box Pro
From £17 per month www.snipca.com/43856
BT’S updated set-top box allows you to watch live Freeview channels and on-demand services without needing a TV aerial. When you set up the BT TV Box Pro, you’ll be given the option to use ‘internet mode’, which connects it to your BT broadband hub over Wi-fi or using the supplied Ethernet cable. This gives you more flexibility as to where you position the box, but you get fewer channels than in ‘aerial mode’ – see the list at www.snipca.com/43857.
BT’S cheapest TV package is the £17 Entertainment plan, which includes Sky channels through a Now Entertainment Pass, AMC and a Netflix Basic plan, with the option to add extra channels – such as films and sport – on a monthby-month basis. You can also watch catch-up content on apps including iplayer, BT Player and
All 4, and subscribe to services such as Amazon Prime Video and Britbox.
Although larger than other new streaming devices, the BT TV Box Pro has the advantage of letting you record up to 600 hours of TV on its 1TB hard drive (pictured above), and pause and rewind live broadcasts for up to two hours. For an extra £10 a month, you can get a BT TV Box Mini to enjoy the same streaming content and features in another room – except the ability to record shows.
Talktalk TV Hub
From £5 per month www.snipca.com/43873
Available to Talktalk broadband customers on its Full Fibre 150 plan or higher, the company’s new TV Hub is initially available for £5 per month, plus a £25 sign-up fee.
The Ultra HD 4K box (pictured below) is powered by Google TV, which allows you to watch all the main streaming services (except All 4), install apps from the Google Play Store and use Google Assistant to search for shows and films using your voice. Interestingly, Talktalk TV Hub also includes a built-in Chromecast, so you can stream content from apps on your phone or tablet, and it connects to your router over your Wi-fi network – with support for Wi-fi 6. You can watch 70 Freeview channels via a TV aerial and use the seven-day TV guide to plan your viewing and catch up with shows you miss.
Although Talktalk TV Hub is cheaper than Sky and BT’S streaming devices, you need to factor in the price of a two-year broadband contract that costs from £30 per month.