Redbox has now launched a new free, ad-supported live TV streaming service. This makes Redbox the latest company to invest in free TV and further highlights the ever-increasing appeal of the AVOD model.
Ad-supported has become big business of late with services, both large and small, looking to take advantage of the AVOD approach. Which is not surprising considering consumers are equally as keen on free content. Tubi, one of the major players in the AVOD market only recently confirmed it now has 25 million monthly active users.
This is not the first time Redbox has looked to streaming to mitigate its reliance on physical content, and it might not be the last. Either way, it would be unwise to think of this as a robust or even finished service. Arguably, it is not even a dedicated streaming service, but instead an additional feature that’s recently been added to the Redbox website and apps.
Redbox’s live TV is basic, but it is free
Redbox’s free live TV service is simply branded as “Free Live TV” and does not even require an email for access. Once the Free Live TV section is selected, the user is immediately booted into a simple, but usable live TV interface.
While it should be expected the channel lineup will expand over time, the list is limited. With this being a free service, users should not be expecting the same variety of channels offered by paid-for live TV services. Instead, the limited selection is very reminiscent of other services and it is highly likely to actually be powered by Xumo – all of the channels (with the exception of Redbox-branded channels) are available through the popular free live TV service.
In fact, as Redbox’s list is more limited, users are better off just opting for the Xumo service in general and skipping on Redbox’s service until it expands more.
Here’s the full list of Redbox free live TV channels:
| Movies | |
| Redbox Spotlight | |
| Redbox Comedy | |
| Redbox Rush | |
| Gravitas movies | |
| CONtv | |
| Filmhub | |
| Docurama | |
| Maverick Movies | |
| Dove now | |
| American Classics | |
| Hi-YAH! | |
| Filmrise | |
| TV | |
| Unsolved mysteries | |
| Forensic files | |
| Family Feud | |
| Global Got Talent | |
| AFV | |
| Entertainment | |
| Fail Army | |
| Comedy Dynamics | |
| The Pet Collective | |
| Food52 | |
| People are Awesome | |
| News | |
| USA Today | |
| TMZ | |
| Now This | |
| Kids | |
| Kabillion | |
| batteryPOP |
Available on desktop and mobile
Providing the service is accessed in a supported area, the Free Live TV feature is available via desktop and through the Redbox mobile app. The list of supported devices does not currently appear to extend to TV platforms yet – at least neither Android TV nor Roku.
Even if the feature does begin to roll out on TV devices, it remains to be seen if Android TV will be included in that list, considering the ‘Redbox for Android TV’ app has not been updated since July of last year.
Source: Redbox
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