How to watch NFL football without cable: Best 2023 streaming options

No professional support has been more savvy and enthusiastic about offering new ways to present footballs games to fans. There are more options than ever for watching–and streaming–NFL games in 2023. Our in-depth guide will show you all the ways you can watch every game in the 2023 season without needing to pay for an expensive cable or satellite TV subscription.

Watch football with an over-the-air antenna

Unlike the NBA, NHL, or MLB, the NFL plays a simple 17-game schedule, with each team playing one game a week. That lends itself to predictable TV programming. The league splits the Sunday afternoon telecasts by conference: generally, AFC games air on CBS, and Fox televises the NFC games.

NBC hosts the popular Sunday Night Football broadcast, which generally kicks off each week at 8:15 p.m. ET. All you’ll need is an over-the-air TV antenna and reasonable proximity to a broadcast tower. You’ll find our top antenna picks here.

As of last year, Thursday Night Football (TNF) has an exclusive new home on Amazon Prime Video. That means that along with Monday Night Football on ESPN, cord-cutters will only be able to see two of the NFL’s most iconic shows via one of the streaming options discussed below. You’ll also need a streaming package to catch the five international games to be played in October and November, which will air on ESPN+ and the NFL Network. And for the first time, NBCUniversal will stream two NFL games on its premium video streaming service, Peacock (prices start at $5.99 per month).

If this abundance of TV offerings has your head swimming like you just took a bone-crushing hit from Lawrence Taylor, check out 506Sports.com or Sports Media Watch. Each site lists which game is on which channel for each week of the season. Bookmark them for easy access.

Stream the NFL via the internet

Even if you don’t have a cable subscription or a TV antenna, you still have plenty of options for catching all the pro pigskin action. Streaming options continue to expand each season, offering plenty of ways to tailor your viewing. But while we highlight what each service offers, the availability of individual channels’ live content can vary by market. It pays to check via each service’s website to see what it offers in your area before subscribing. You’ll find TechHive’s picks of the best streaming services at the preceding link.

DirectTV offers CBS, NBC, Fox, and ESPN in its $64.99-per-month Entertainment package. Note that DirectTV packages require a cable-TV-like two-year commitment, after which they revert to month-to-month at whatever the current price is.

Paramount+ streams CBS’s NFL telecasts to subscribers of its $5.99-per-month Essential plan. We have another story that provides even more details about watching NFL games on Paramount+.

Fubo will give you CBS, FOX, and NBC for all Sunday games, as well as ESPN for Monday Night Football and the NFL Network as part of its PRO package, which costs $74.99 per month. For an additional $10.99 per month, you can also get NFL RedZone via the service’s Sports Plus add-on.

Hosted by Scott Hanson and existing only for about a seven-hour window each Sunday, RedZone airs nothing but the day’s highlights (mostly touchdowns, as the name suggests) at a frenetic pace that perfectly evokes the adrenaline rush of a game-winning drive. Here’s an easy guide to signing up for NFL RedZone.

Both Hulu + Live TV and YouTube TV include CBS, NBC, Fox, ESPN, and NFL Network in their subscriptions, for $69.99 and $72.99 per month respectively. YouTube TV is offering the first three months for $64.99 right now. YouTube TV also offers NFL RedZone as part of its Sports Plus add-on for an additional $10.99 a month. YouTube also has the rights to offer NFL Sunday Ticket, which will let you stream all Sunday out-of-market NFL games.

Sling TV’s Orange and Blue package gets you NBC, Fox, ESPN, and the NFL Network for $60 a month. Currently, the company is offering the first month for half off.

To watch Thursday Night Football, you’ll need to sign up for a Amazon Prime subscription, which costs $14.99 per month or $139 per year. That also gets you unlimited streaming access to thousands of movies and TV shows, the Amazon Music streaming service, a one-year subscription to Grubhub+, and free delivery on most Amazon orders.

Peacock will exclusively carry the December 23 primetime matchup between the the Buffalo Bills and the Los Angeles Chargers. It will also stream a Wild Card playoff game on January 13, 2024. A Peacock Premium plan costs $5.99 a month; a Premium Plus Plan, $11.99 per month, removes ads and enables you to download and watch select titles offline.

What’s included with an NFL+ subscription?

Last year, the NFL launched its own streaming service, NFL+, which replaced its popular subscription package, NFL Game Pass. A $6.99-per-month ($39.99 per season) NFL+ subscription includes includes NFL RedZone, which you can stream to your mobile devices as well as your big-screen TV. NFL RedZone highlights the critical “red-zone” plays during Sunday afternoon games.

To get everything Game Pass offered, however, you’ll need an NFL+ Premium plan, which costs $14.99 per month ($79.99 per season). That includes access to all out-of-market preseason games live, and the ability to replay every regular-season game after its conclusion in either full or condensed versions. If you can live without seeing the action, you can instead opt for live localized radio broadcasts from wherever you have broadband access.

The NFL+ Premium plan also gives you on-demand access to NFL Films Library (America’s Game, Mic’d Up, Super Bowl Classics, and so on) and NFL Network Shows (Good Morning Football, Total Access, and Fantasy Live). You also get the aforementioned NFL RedZone.

It’s worth noting that you don’t need to purchase a separate subscription to get on-the-go access to live games, as that’s offered with many of the services listed above.

Michael Brown/Foundry

Michael Brown/Foundry

Michael Brown/Foundry

What’s next for NFL streaming?

Super Bowl LVII broke streaming records, with the NFL championship game becoming the most-streamed NFL game ever. That shows that there is an audience willing to embrace alternatives to cable sports broadcasts. And if the NFL continues to make a serious commitment to live streaming, perhaps it will set a new bar for live sports coverage in the 21st century just as it did in the 20th.

Looking for even more ways to watch the game this season? Don’t miss our guide to streaming NFL RedZone and our roundup of second-screen apps.