- NBCUniversal’s new streaming service Peacock launches today, July 15th, and you can sign up and watch more than 13,000 hours of programming for free.
- Peacock is one of the only major streaming services to offer a free tier, but you can pay $4.99 per month to upgrade to Peacock Premium for even more content.
- You can also pay $9.99 per month for Peacock Premium Plus, which removes almost all of the ads, but an ad blocker seems to work just as well on PeacockTV.com.
NBCUniversal is throwing its hat in the ring this week with a brand new streaming service called Peacock.
The streamer first launched for Comcast Xfinity customers weeks ago, but Peacock is finally open to the public, and unlike most other video streaming services, you can sign up for this one free of charge. Aside from its huge library of NBC shows such as The Office, Parks and Recreation, and Saturday Night Live, Peacock’s big draw is that it has a free tier that anyone can access. You don’t even need a credit card to make an account.
If you want to sign up, head to PeacockTV.com, enter your email address and a password, and click the big “Create Account” button. You’ll receive a verification email in your inbox and you can start streaming hundreds of TV shows and movies right away. And if you never upgrade to the premium tier, you’ll never be charged.
Now that you have a Peacock account, you are probably wondering what to watch. After all, NBCUniversal says that the service’s free tier features more than 13,000 hours of programming. That’s a ton of content to sort through. The good news is that the company listed a bunch of the highlights available at launch in a press release:
Peacock Free Tier Movies:
- The Bourne Identity, The Bourne Supremacy, The Bourne Ultimatum, Jurassic Park, Jurassic Park III, Tully, Phantom Thread, The Interpreter, American Psycho, The Matrix, The Matrix Reloaded, The Matrix Revolutions, The Blair Witch Project, The Mummy, Joe, Fletch, Fletch Lives, The Chronicles of Riddick: Dark Fury, Fear, Psycho, Do the Right Thing, Howard the Duck, Billy Elliot, The Birds, Willie, Fear and Loathing In Las Vegas, The Last House On The Left, I Am Ali, In The Name of the Father, Lone Ranger, The Hitcher, Law Abiding Citizen, The Sting, What Dreams May Come, Fried Green Tomatoes, One True Thing, Gosford Park, Dracula, and Dragnet.
Peacock Free Tier TV Comedies:
- 30 Rock, Parks and Recreation, Saturday Night Live, Saved by the Bell, Punky Brewster, The Johnny Carson Show, The Carol Burnett Show, Real Husbands of Hollywood and Everybody Hates Chris
Peacock Free Tier TV Dramas:
- Friday Night Lights, Downton Abbey, Parenthood, Monk, Heroes, Psych, The Game, Suits, Sacred Lies, Royal Pains, Battlestar Galactica, Columbo, Hunter, The Rockford Files, Dateline, 21 Jump Street, Highlander, Leave It To Beaver, Munsters and Murder She Wrote
Peacock Free Tier TV Reality Shows:
- Below Deck, Southern Charm, Chrisley Knows Best, Botched, Flipping Out, Million Dollar Listing New York, Pawn Stars, Storage Wars, Real Housewives of Dallas, Jay Leno’s Garage, Shahs of Sunset and Undercover Boss
Peacock Free Tier TV Competitions:
- Top Chef Masters, Hell’s Kitchen, Hollywood Game Night, and American Ninja Warrior Jr.
Peacock Free Tier TV Kids Shows:
- Kong: The Animated Series, Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures, Fievel’s American Tails and Woody Woodpecker
Peacock Free Tier TV Spanish-Language:
- Betty en NY, I Love Jenni, Reina De Corazones, The Riveras, Preso No. 1, Caso Cerrado, El Baron, El Chema, Larrymania, Perro Amor, Mi Familia Perfecta, Quien es Quien, Victoria and Donde Esta Elisa
Peacock free tier users will also be able to watch some live sports, including four exclusive Premier League matches on launch day, the U.S. Open Championship and Women’s Open Championships, an NFL Wild Card Playoff Game, and select events from the upcoming Tokyo and Beijing Olympics.
If you want everything Peacock has to offer, you can pay $4.99 per month to upgrade to Peacock Premium or $9.99 per month for Peacock Premium Plus, which has all of the same content as Premium, but without ads. And speaking of ads, it appears that, at least for now, an ad blocker on your browser is able to successfully block ads from running on PeacockTV.com. NBCUniversal will undoubtedly fix this mistake soon, but if you want to watch a few episodes of 30 Rock today without ads, all you need to do is install an ad blocker and press play.
Thankfully, Peacock’s ad breaks aren’t especially long in the first place, so you might not mind them.
