How to Watch NFL Games in 2023 With & Without Cable
By Matt Conner
As it turns out, football is football (at least in popularity), even if the sport is completely opposite.
Because of the enormity of the National Football League's popularity, it's no surprise that every media outlet seems to want to own some slice of the broadcasting pie these days. NFL broadcasts tend to dominate not only every other sporting event going on around the same time, but it even trumps anything else entertainment companies can put out there for consumption.
This poses a real problem for sports fans who want to be able to catch anything and everything. That means it can be easy to feel as if you have to subscribe to anything and everything as well. And it keeps getting worse as streaming services are now getting into the mix, further subverting the systems in place and makign things even more compicated than ever before.
Consider this: to watch the NFL in 2023, you'll need NBC to catch the first preseason game of the year and their friends at Peacock for a rare postseason special only available on the app. You'll need ABC or ESPN to catch the NFL Draft, Amazon to catch Thursday night games, CBS to watch the Super Bowl, and FOX to watch some regular season and postseason action. All of those stations will carry Wild Card games as well.
Without cable, it's quite possible to watch a lot of the NFL season if you're at least able to secure an over-the-air antenna. That should provide the majority of readers with at least local broadcast channels that pick up in-market games from the AFC and NFC, depending on the channel and week.
For those with the money to burn,NFL Sunday Ticketis the best option but it will set you back a few hundred dollars via YouTube TV. They will broadcast most games for out-of-market teams and it also includes several other channels, but yeah, the service is pricey and it doesn't even includeeverything, which feels wrong to not have a single bundle available somewhere.