BT’s announcement that Freeview channels are now available on its TV boxes without an aerial is good news for those with dodgy reception in their area – while most of the content on the BT TV Box Pro was already based on streaming, Freeview still required an aerial – until now.
With the new “Internet Mode”, available on the Box Pro and the newly released Box Mini, customers can watch Freeview channels aerial free, and even continue to record and pause live programmes.
However, there’s also some bad news: As with Virgin’s Stream Box and Sky Glass – BT’s streaming competitors – you only get some, and not all, of the Freeview channels on BT TV’s ‘Internet Mode’.
So while many of the big and well-known Freeview/YouView channels are here, many other major Freeview channels are still missing – such as the NOW 70s / NOW 80s / NOW 90s music channels, the Great! Movie Channels (formerly Sony Movies), QVC and others.
According to BT, more channels will be added in the future. But for now, here’s the complete list of streaming apps and channels which are available as of this writing.
BT TV Box Pro / Box Mini: Streaming Apps
Compared to other streaming devices, the BT TV boxes only offer a handful of apps. Therefore, Disney+, Apple TV+, Paramount+, YouTube and many others are not currently available.
But these are the apps that you do get, as of this writing:
BT TV Apps:
- Sky’s NOW (With its streaming TV memberships – Entertainment, Cinema, Sports and Kids)
- BT Sport
- BT Player (BT’s VOD store)
- AMC Channel
YouView/Freeview Catch-up Apps:
- BBC iPlayer
- ITV Hub
- All4
- My5
- UKTV Play
- S4C
- STV Player
- POP Player
- BBC Sounds
Entertainment/Kids Streaming Apps:
- Netflix
- Amazon’s Prime Video
- BritBox
- Milkshake!
- VOD365 – includes YAAS, Ketchup Kids, Planet Knowledge & Sports Channel Network
- CBS / Legend Catchup
- S4C Clic
- PlayWorks
BT TV Box Pro / Box Mini: Streaming Freeview Channels
Note that many of these channels are available in HD – even channels that aren’t currently in HD when you use a Freeview box and an aerial.
Furthermore, BBC News HD – which is no longer available on Freeview when you use an aerial – is available here.
- BBC One HD
- BBC Two HD
- ITV1 HD (UTV HD for viewers in Northern Ireland)
- Channel 4 HD (S4C for viewers in Wales)
- Channel 5 HD
- ITV2 HD
- BBC Alba HD (for viewers in Scotland only), Channel 4 HD for viewers in Wales)
- BBC Four HD (BBC Scotland HD for viewers in Scotland)
- ITV 3 HD
- Sky Arts
- Quest
- E4
- Film4
- REALLY
- More4
- 5USA HD
- BBC Three HD
- BBC Four HD (for viewers in Scotland only)
- ITV4 HD
- ITVBe HD
- E4 Extra
- 5Star HD
- 5 Action HD
- Pick
- DMAX
- QUEST RED
- Legend
- food network
- HGTV
- Challenge
- 4seven
- 5SELECT HD
- CBS reality
- Reality Xtra
- CBBC HD
- CBeebies HD
- CITV HD
- BBC News HD
- BBC Parliament HD
- Sky News
- BBC Sounds Radio channels
- Additional regional channels (where available)
BT TV Aerial Free Channels List: What’s Missing?
While all the public broadcasters are here, along with a decent list of other Freeview channels – some popular channels that are available when you plug an aerial in, are not available on BT’s boxes when you use them in Internet Mode.
Some of the major Freeview channels that are currently missing from BT TV Box Pro (aerial free) and BT TV Box Mini are:
NOW 70s / NOW 80s / NOW 90s – A trio of Freeview music channels that air nonstop music from different decades.
Great! TV / Great! Movies / Great! Movies Action / Great Movies Classic – These were formerly known as the Sony Movies channels, and they’re normally available on Freeview and Freesat. They mostly air a revolving selection of older movies and old TV shows.
QVC – The popular TV shopping channels are available on Freeview, Freesat and Sky – but shoppers won’t be able to find them on BT TV’s internet-only mode.
TalkTV / GBNews – The two right-winged news channels won’t be available here either as Freeview channels or via their streaming apps.
That’s TV: A channel dedicated to classic TV and nostalgia, with old British comedy programmes like The Benny Hill Show.
I own the BT TV PRO 4K box and haven’t been able to receive some of the channels listed above:
BBC NEWS HD
FIVE US HD
FIVE STAR HD
ITV3 HD
ITV4 HD
These specific channels are only available in SD.
I have retuned and software is updated frequently (software update searches are performed each time box is powered up).
But the HD channels listed are still not available.
Why can’t I get Drama channel on my BT TV?
Is this available to everyone as a”stand alone” box, or do you have to be a BT customer?
What about data channels? I like Channelbox, which allows me to watch various European TV channels including the France 24 news channel live and, obviously, in French. Currently I can no longer receive this via aerial Freeview due, presumably, to poor reception.
It’s not available without a BT broadband subscription, unfortunately.
And I don’t think Channelbox is available on YouView boxes at all (and the BT TV Pro is a YouView box).
What’s the point on having it iff you cant get your favourite channels I’ve a smart tv so I get great tv and films on the streaming channels anyway
What about the W channel, is it available on the BT Pro box via internet. If so, is it HD?
One of the things I wanted to kindly ask you which I’ve struggled with for ages now is when will something be brought in, such as a device where you can back up your DVD’s digitally and watch them without the need for a DVD player.
As TV is transitioning now I feel like this is very important, I wouldn’t be surprised if they stop making DVD and Blu Ray players before long and in 2022 we need to be able to access our DVD’s and Blu Rays in a way we can watch them digitally.
I have so many DVD’s that aren’t available on streaming platforms, some I have purchased again just so I can watch them this way (which isn’t great having to buy them again but it’s ok) though many aren’t available and if we had a storage device we could link up with our Firestick (or whatever media device we have) to play these DVD’s together (like a series where you can press play and they play episodes one after the other) that would be awesome!
I know you can set up PC’s and I’ve heard of Plex but don’t understand it and I have tried with Google Drive (I think it was this) but cancelled it cause it only let me have a couple of mins per video or something (I forget what it was but it didn’t work anyway) however all this is too confusing and difficult to do.
We just need a simple device that connects where we can store these DVD’s we have bought and link up on our Firestick’s or whatever media we use for our streaming services.
Hopefully Amazon will work on this but do you think you could do an article on this because unless the media mention it often, there’s very little chance Amazon or any company are going to bother and we do need something.
Thanks Or, I really appreciate you and your articles are wonderful!!
Not possible. Mostly due to the way numerous copy protection schemes work. While it might copy many disks, it would fail on a lot too. Also I’m sure the studios wouldn’t welcome their disks being copied anyway.
I think most people (who are doing this) use Plex for what you’re describing. It does have a bit of a learning curve, but basically, you rip the DVDs you own on your desktop computer (using software like Handbrake for example), and then use Plex – which has an app for the Amazon Fire TV (and almost every other streaming device) – to stream those files from your desktop to your TV.
Yeah, you’d have to have a PC on all the time also wouldn’t you?
I’ve always struggled with it and in regards to the copyright thing mentioned above, well there would be means and ways they could go round to protect it, for example if it’s locked onto the device you save it on or something.
It’s just a struggle being able to play them on these devices while DVD’s and DVD players seem to be phasing out. I read that DVD sales have declined by over 85% so it would be cool if we could transition them somehow to play with the current platforms we’re moving into as not everything is available digitally (unless they did this then that would be awesome!!).
All I want to do is watch my DVD’s on my TV without the need for a DVD player (which I also don’t have anymore).
Thanks for the kind reply, I really appreciate it 🙂