NOW TV review 2025: Is it any good?

Dan Howdle • February 18th, 2025

NOW TV (rather unhelpfully rebranded to just NOW) is a subscription-based streaming service that allows you to watch top Sky content on a flexible month-by-month basis. You don’t need a full Sky TV subscription, just a smart TV or a streaming device such as an Amazon Fire Stick, a Roku stick, Google Chromecast or Apple TV, or NOW's own streaming stick. And you can choose any combination of NOW’s Sports, Cinema, Entertainment, or reality TV Memberships.

Is NOW TV any good?

Key features

Here’s a quick look at what you can expect to find in a NOW package.

Channels	Around 50, depending on your membership(s)
Technology	Internet
Bundles	With NOW Broadband
Set-top box	NOW TV Smart Box, games console, NOW Smart Stick, Smart TV, App
Prices from	£8.99 per month

Channels

All NOW Memberships offer a mix of live channels and on demand content. The channels you get depend on which Memberships you choose to take.

NOW Entertainment Membership

The NOW Entertainment Membership gives you access to Sky One, Sky Witness, Sky Atlantic, Sky Comedy, Gold, Comedy Central, Sci Fi, Sky History, Sky Nature, Sky Arts, Sky Documentaries and Sky Crime. That's only a third of the number of channels that you get with a Sky TV subscription, but it does include arguably Sky's most popular channel, Sky Atlantic. There are around 40 live channels included and most people will probably find it plenty.

You also get access to on demand content with the Entertainment Membership, and catch-up is available for up to 30 days. There are more than 300 box sets from premium channels, with must-see shows, although the top-tier shows come and go frequently (due to distribution agreements), so be sure the show you want to watch is currently available before signing up.

NOW Cinema Membership

With NOW's Cinema Membership you get more than 1,000 movies on demand, with a wide range of classics and new releases. There are themed movie collections, including science fiction, horror, action, comedy, Disney and romance, along with seasonal collections at Christmas and Halloween for example. Even if you manage to watch your way through the lot, there's a new premiere every day to keep you entertained.

You also get access to 11 live Sky Cinema channels, namely Premiere, Hits, Action, Animation, Family, Comedy, Sci-Fi & Horror, Thriller, Greats, Drama, and Select. The platform often adds temporary channels, such as Sky Cinema Christmas during the seasonal months.

Kids Membership

The NOW Kids Membership is no more. Instead it's been rolled into NOW's Entertainment Membership, so provided you get that, you'll get the kids channels thrown in for nothing.

There are thousands of episodes to choose from, with plenty of content for kids of all ages, from babies up to teens. Parental controls mean you can choose what your kids are able to watch. However, the lack of Disney channels may leave some customers disappointed. For that, you will need to sign up to Disney+ as well.

NOW Sports Membership

The Sky Sports Membership works rather differently from NOW’s other memberships, enabling people who just want to watch occasional sporting events to do so. Whatever length of Sports membership you buy (a day, a week, or a month), you'll get access to the same eleven channels, though one-day memberships get expensive fast.

There's a dedicated channel for the Premier League as well as football, cricket, golf, Formula 1 and horse racing.

The Sky Sports Action, Arena and Mix channels cover Rugby Union, Rugby League, boxing, darts, NFL, tennis, athletics and more. There's a Main Event channel dedicated to the biggest live events from across Sky's range of sports channels. And of course, there’s Sky Sports News – what else are you going to watch on transfer deadline day?

It's worth bearing in mind with the NOW Sports Membership that though the other memberships on offer all represent great value versus the content they provide, a one-month Sports membership on NOW is one of the most expensive ways to watch Sky Sports.

Hayu Membership

The Hayu membership allows you to stream the latest reality shows from the US and stay up-to-date with programmes such as Keeping Up with the Kardashians and The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. There are no live channels included but there are more than 8,000 episodes to watch on demand.

Set-top box

NOW TV Smart Box

You don’t need a NOW TV Smart Box or Smart Stick in order to watch NOW TV. You can do so via any device that supports the NOW TV app, such as games consoles, smart TVs, other streaming sticks or streaming devices, tablets, mobiles, and so on. But if you just have a basic TV and are looking to beef up your viewing options, it might be worth getting a NOW TV Box or Stick as your main smart/app source.

Add-ons

Multiroom

NOW TV doesn't offer a Multiroom package and installation in the same way that Sky TV or EE TV does. But it is possible for two people to watch NOW in different rooms at the same time. You can register up to six devices to your NOW account and then use two of them simultaneously. Compatible devices include PS4/PS5, Xbox One/Xbox Series, smart TVs, Roku, Apple TV, Chromecast, tablets and phones using iOS or Android, and more.

Packages and bundles

Bundles with broadband

As with the individual NOW membership, you can sign up for either NOW or NOW Broadband separately or take both. There are also times when NOW bundles them together as a special offer and it’s at times like these that you can save yourself quite a bit of money.

The bundles vary over time, so sometimes it’ll be a NOW Smart Box and NOW Broadband bundled together. At other times it’ll be a specific membership, such as the NOW Cinema Membership that is bundled in with NOW Broadband. Free anytime calls are often included with NOW Broadband deals.

TV on its own

NOW doesn’t insist on you being a NOW Broadband customer before you can sign up for it – but you will need a broadband connection from any provider. You can order the NOW Smart Stick if you need one on its own or with a few months’ worths of Membership included. The NOW TV Smart Stick can also be bought pre-loaded with a month of Sky Sports, a month of Sky Cinema or two months of Entertainment.

If you don’t want a set-top box or a streaming stick and it’s just a NOW membership you’re after, that’s OK too. You can start a 7-day free trial of the Entertainment, Sky Cinema or Hayu membership and then either pay the monthly price or cancel. There are also often introductory offers and discounts for taking multiple memberships at the same time.

The Sky Sports membership works a bit differently, as it will automatically renew unless canceled beforehand, but there’s now a 7-day free trial period. The day and week memberships are treated as one-off purchases so there’s no need to cancel. Again, look out for special offers and discounts.

An important note on image and audio quality

Before we reach our final conclusion, we feel we must warn, with a completely separate note here, of the comparatively low-quality images and sounds provided by the NOW platform as standard. At 720p, and stereo (not surround) sound provided at a low bitrate, from a technical standpoint, NOW has fallen a long way behind its competitors.

720p is better than DVD quality, but lower than blu-ray quality. As TVs get bigger and cheaper, the amount of pixels – the resolution – on-screen starts to matter more. And with the likes of Netflix and Amazon choosing 4K as their de facto resolution for new shows and movies, they are sending images to your screen that are more than 10 times sharper than NOW TV provides without adding Boost or Ultra Boost (see below). If you have a TV of 50 inches or less, you may not notice the low resolution so much, but people with larger sets and/or surround sound systems are likely to be unimpressed. In a dedicated cinema room, forget it, it's unwatchable.

NOW Boost and Ultra Boost

NOW has introduced the option to pay extra per month for Boost (1080p, 5.1 surround sound) of Ultra Boost (4K HDR, Dolby Atmos). This allows viewing in Full 1080p HD, or full 4K HDR, provides surround sound or Dolby Atmos audio respectively, and permits customers up to three streams so that three members of your household can stream at once with the Ultra Boost option. Full HD as standard is what we’d like to see NOW offering, but at least with Boost and Ultra Boost, you can insist on better quality, albeit at a cost to your pocket. It's also worth noting that by the time you've added Ultra Boost, you're going to be paying Sky Stream money, and Sky Stream offers a whole lot more for the price.

Our verdict: Good

In some ways NOW TV is a cut-down version of Sky TV, but it still offers some cracking content. It’s an easy and commitment-free way to access Sky Sports for those important events. And the Entertainment Membership is a cheaper way of watching Sky Atlantic shows than taking out a full Sky subscription. All this without the need for a satellite dish or a lengthy contract. However, when you add Boost or Ultra Boost to bring your audio and video up to the quality Sky Stream offers by default, there's only a couple of quid in it if that, while Sky Stream offers vastly more content.

The NOW Stick is a really cheap way to turn your standard television into a smart TV, and even comes with voice control. On top of that, the company offers truly unlimited broadband at a decent price. All in all, if you're looking for solid content on a flexible contract and at a good price. It's good value in and of itself, but with Sky Stream on the scene, we struggle to find reasons for choosing this over that.

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