ITVX, the new streaming service from ITV that’s replacing ITV Hub, is now available on Sky TV’s devices. But, for now, only on Sky Glass and Sky Stream.
Although ITVX’s “official” launch date is December 8, a soft roll-out is already underway (it began on November 17), and more devices are being added every week.
Today, it’s Sky’s turn, with the company’s streaming devices getting the new app first (this also means ITVX will now be ITV’s new catch-up and on-demand platform on Glass and Stream – see more on that below).
Customers with Sky’s broadband-based devices, Sky Glass and Stream, should be seeing their ITV Hub app “transform” into an ITVX app today (Monday).
If you’re not seeing the new app yet, it may help – in some cases – to unplug your Glass/Stream and then plug it back in, forcing a restart – and the ITVX app may appear at that point.
Since the roll-out is ongoing, some devices may still show the ITV Hub icon, even though it’s already loading ITVX. Furthermore, it seems that as of this writing, the “ITVX” voice command isn’t working yet – and instead, you still need to say “ITV Hub” – but that will probably get resolved shortly.
ITVX On Sky – What Do You Get?
ITV’s new streaming app, ITVX, is a free-to-watch (with adverts) service that’s replacing the long-running ITV Hub app.
ITV aims for ITVX to become more than a “catch-up” service, and more of a streaming destination: it launched with more than 10,000 hours of on-demand content, including 35 flagship shows (which will be coming from December 8), 200+ series and 250+ films.
In addition to the on-demand content, you can also stream all of ITV’s live channels via the app, as well as several “themed” ad-supported live channels that are dedicated to a single series or theme.
While ITV is focusing heavily on the ad-supported free tier, ITVX also has a paid Premium tier, which removes all the adverts when you’re watching on-demand content.
Premium tier subscribers will also get access to the entire content library of BritBox, which includes more than 4,000 hours of classic British shows and films.
The Premium tier currently costs £5.99/month or £59.99/year.
However, Sky Glass and Sky Stream users already have the Ad-Skipping add-on. It’s free for the first 18 months, so most Sky customers should still have it at this point – after which it’ll cost £5/month.
While Sky’s Ad-Skipping service does work on ITVX (when you’re watching on your Sky device), it’s a bit different from ITVX Premium, as it doesn’t eliminate the adverts – but instead lets you fast-forward them when you’re watching content on ITVX.
You won’t, however, get access to the BritBox content without the direct ITVX Premium subscription.
ITVX – Sky’s New ITV On-Demand Tool
Unlike Sky Q, Sky Glass (see our review) and Sky Stream (see our review) don’t use satellite dishes, and instead, rely on broadband.
Furthermore, they don’t have any local storage and recording capabilities. Instead, for most of the streaming services and channels, they rely on streaming content from the broadcaster’s app.
So when you watch a BBC show, you’re getting it through BBC iPlayer. And when you watch an ITV show (on demand), you’ve been getting it from the ITV Hub app.
Now, with ITVX replacing Hub, every time you pick an ITV on-demand show/film to watch – ITVX is the app that will now run, instead of ITV Hub.
In addition to having more content than before, ITVX offers a new and improved user interface, and better streaming quality (but there’s no 4K content on ITVX yet).
For now, however, it seems ITVX is still suffering from a lot of early-day issues on other devices – we’ll have to wait and see how it performs on Sky’s devices.
Is ITVX Coming To Sky Q?
The full ITV Hub app was never available on Sky Q – instead, only a limited selection of ITV’s catch-up shows were available on Sky Q (and even that selection was cut down this year).
Before ITVX launched, ITV repeatedly said that they were hoping to make ITVX available on Sky Q at – or near – the official launch date.
We’re still days away from that date (December 8), so that may still happen – but at this point, it looks like that Sky Q launch may get delayed.
We reached out to Sky for more information on this, and will update the article accordingly.
