Here, we compare the amount of content available on Netflix, Amazon Prime, NOW, BritBox, Apple TV Plus, Disney Plus and the all-new Sky Stream to help you choose which streaming service is right for you.
How much does each streaming service cost?
Here's a rundown of the latest prices for each TV streaming service, as of February 2024.
How much does Netflix cost?
Netflix costs £4.99 a month for its Standard Package with ads, and £10.99 a month for Standard without ads, both of which offer viewing in 1080p. The Netflix Premium package is £17.99 a month which lets you watch up up to 4K + HDR.
Each subscription package will have different allowances in terms of the number of screens you can watch on at the same time and your ability to download to those devices.
How much does Disney Plus cost?
Disney Plus used to cost £7.99 a month for its entire set of programmes. This came with an annual option of £79.90, which saved you 15% over the course of the year.
However, more recently it introduced to two new subscription tiers - a more basic, ad-supported subscription costing £4.99 per month, and a more expensive Premium tier for £10.99.
Those on an existing Disney Plus subscription will be moved onto the more expensive Disney Plus Premium, which lets you continue watching content in 4K. But you'll get the option to move onto the cheaper Standard (£7.99) or Basic (£4.99) subscription should you want a cheaper package.
How much does Amazon Prime Video cost?
Amazon Prime membership costs £8.99 a month and comes with all of the Amazon Prime perks, including free next-day delivery and access to Amazon Prime Video. Alternatively, you can pay £95 for the year upfront, which works out to be the equivalent of £7.92 per month.
You can get access to just Prime Video for £5.99, but to be honest the real value of Amazon comes from a full Prime membership so it's definitely worth taking advantage of the 30-day trial.
How much does Apple TV Plus cost?
Apple TV Plus is priced at £8.99 a month but comes with a free three-month subscription when you purchase any new Apple product including MacBooks, iPads and iPhones.
How much does NOW cost?
NOW has several different price points: an Entertainment TV membership costs £9.99 a month (£6.99 if you sign up for six months).
NOW Cinema also costs £9.99, and a Sports membership costs £34.99 a month (£26 if you sign up for 12 months), or a one-off payment of £11.98 for a Sports Day + Mobile Month Membership.
How much does Sky Stream cost?
At the time of writing, the cheapest monthly tariff for Sky Stream is currently £26 per month for Sky Entertainment & Netflix (£29 per month on a monthly rolling contract). Sky add-ons like Sky Cinema and Sky Sports will, as usual, incur extra monthly costs too.
So if you plan on streaming the full extent of the provider's premium TV service, Sky Stream would end up costing a lot more than other streaming services.
TV deals
Take a look at the latest TV packages on Uswitch.
Streaming service free trial
Streaming service free trials are less common these days, with platforms like Netflix, Amazon Prime and Disney Plus all discontinuing theirs in favour of flexible monthly memberships.
You can still get a free Apple TV Plus membership when you purchase a new Apple device like an iPad, Apple Watch or iPhone.
You can also still get a 7-day free trial for NOW Entertainment and Cinema memberships, but not for NOW Sports.
Which streaming service has the best content?
So we know what each service costs, but what are you getting for your money? Each platform has a different mix of new and original content versus a back catalogue of TV shows and movies for subscribers to access.
Netflix
Though Netflix started as a DVD rental site, its biggest selling point these days is the amount of original content it produces alongside the staggering back catalogue of titles available on demand.
To date, Netflix currently has over 13,000 titles worldwide, including everything from TV shows, children’s content, films and documentaries. The number of titles varies significantly across territories, with UK subscribers currently able to access around 3,000 titles in total.
In addition to great shows like Stranger Things, The Crown, Orange Is the New Black and Ozark, Netflix’s original films have even gone on to be nominated –– and in some cases win –– Academy Awards such as Roma, Marriage Story and The Irishman.
With so much new and classic content you’ll never run out of things to binge.
Amazon Prime Video
Netflix undoubtedly has a huge amount of content, but Amazon Prime has the edge in terms of numbers. And while new content is being introduced all the time, Amazon is said to have more than 24,000 movies and 2,100 shows available for streaming.
Amazon Prime also has its own slew of original TV shows and films, as well as the option of signing up to Amazon Prime Channels where you can access things like ITV Hub, and BFI film player.
And if you come across a film or TV show that isn’t available to stream, Amazon Prime also has the option to buy or rent content for an additional charge, so the possibilities are seemingly endless.
NOW
Regarding numbers, NOW has fewer titles available to stream, sitting at roughly 3,000 films, TV shows and children's titles. What sets NOW apart is your access to brand-new international shows.
Since NOW is the streaming service for Sky TV, the UK’s largest pay-TV provider, it gives you access to brand-new content unavailable anywhere else on the internet.
Most notably, NOW is the only platform to stream HBO shows in the UK. The same is true for films post-cinema releases, as Sky Movies will still be the first place to see new releases after they’ve left the cinema.
And while Amazon Prime has started streaming some live sports events, NOW is the hands-down winner for those wanting access to sports channels.
Our best NOW deals
Want access to all the great content from Sky without signing up for a long-term contract? Stream what you want, when you want with our latest NOW TV & broadband deals on Uswitch.
Sky Stream
You can also access all of Sky TV's content through its latest offering, Sky Stream, a simple streaming device that replicates the whole Sky experience without needing a dish or set-top box.
All of Sky Q's content options, including its premium add-ons Sky Cinema and Sky Sports, are available through Sky Stream in up to 4K picture quality, as opposed to NOW's offering, which is limited to HD.
Apple TV+
Apple TV+ has by far the least amount of content on its streaming platform. Introduced in November 2019, Apple TV+ claimed its focus would be on quality over quantity, recruiting some of the biggest names in Hollywood to appear in and create their lineup of shows.
Names like Jennifer Anniston, Reese Witherspoon, Chris Evans, Samuel L. Jackson, Jason Momoa, and M. Night Shyamalan, to name a few.
The current slate of Apple TV+ shows stands at just 25, which is obviously significantly smaller than Netflix and Amazon, but Apple has proven successful in drawing users into subscription services in the past, perhaps the success of Apple Music will be replicated with Apple TV+.
Disney Plus
Disney Plus’s biggest advantage is the sheer volume of content it already possessed when it launched, with roughly 7,000 TV episodes and 500 films. This included original TV shows and films from Disney Channel and Freeform, as well as select titles from 20th Century Fox Television and ABC Studios.
Disney has also invested heavily in creating exclusive content for the streaming platform, with a wealth of Star Wars and Marvel TV shows that are available exclusively on Disney Plus.
BritBox
As the name suggests, BritBox is the streaming home of British boxsets. So while its range is limited to those shows produced in the UK and broadcast on BBC and ITV, it can still claim to have the biggest collection of its niche.
According to Ampere Analysis, BritBox has the biggest collection of British boxsets than any other streaming service (independently verified on 31st January 2020).
BritBox (289)
Prime Video (256)
NOW (219)
Netflix (162)
Who has the most content?
In this case, there’s no clear winner. If you want to watch the latest episodes of international shows, then NOW is for you. But Netflix’s library of top-quality original content is hard for any TV-lover to miss. And the sheer volume of titles available on Amazon Prime makes it a good option too.
Which streaming service is easiest to use?
So many people have cursed Netflix for losing hours of their lives to mindlessly scrolling through the homepage trying to figure out what to watch. But is Netflix really lacking? Are any other streaming services easier to use?
Netflix
Spotlight
At the top of the screen, Netflix features a full-width banner which spotlights one of its newest releases. This is almost exclusively a Netflix Original –– either a TV show, movie or mini-series –– and will often autoplay a trailer so that you get a quick idea if you want to watch it or not.
Categories
Netflix has a number of different categories that makes it easier to browse, such as blockbuster films, documentaries and British comedies. This makes it easier for you to quickly dip into the content that you’re in the mood for that day.
Trending Now
Netflix is also currently the only streaming platform that has a dedicated ‘Trending Now’ section, which is a great way to get inspiration for what to watch based on what the rest of the UK is streaming right now. It’s especially great for being in the loop with the latest online TV chatter.
Recommendations — “Because you watched…”
Like most platforms, Netflix has a method of delivering recommendations, with lists of TV shows and movies based on what you recently watched.
My List
Most platforms have a watchlist option where you can queue up the content you think you might want to watch later. For Netflix, this seems very much an afterthought, and while I’ve added plenty of things to ‘My List’ over the years, I’m hardly ever prompted to actually watch them as the list sits four or five rows down on the home screen.
NOW
The amount of new and exclusive content on NOW makes it a serious competitor to Netflix, but is it easy to navigate and find all those great TV shows and movies?
New and Trending
Upon logging in to NOW, your first section is dedicated to New and Trending content. This is possibly where the diversity of NOW’s content actually works against them as it often recommends content you would never consider.
I’m initially greeted with an ad for Dora the Explorer’s live-action movie and an animated version of Streetcat Bob. This is obviously based on what the kids are binging during lockdown but has nothing to do with my viewing habits.
While Netflix successfully sections off its children’s content, with NOW you’ll have to scroll past it in search of shows you actually want to watch.
Watchlist
Unlike Netflix, NOW’s watchlist is prominently featured right under the ‘Continue Watching’ section. Once you’ve scrolled through and added shows to your watchlist, you’ll see them promptly whenever you log on, giving you a good starting point when searching for an episode of something to watch.
Previews
The second section is labelled Previews, and it is just that; a list of 40-second previews highlighting films, TV shows or collections you can watch on the platform.
Categories
The home page is finally divided into sections based on the TV passes you can purchase. They’re arranged in the order of Sky Cinema, Entertain, Kids, Hayu and Sports.
This can also be frustrating if you’re not subscribed to the Sky Cinema pass, since you have to constantly scroll past all the movie recommendations to get to the content you can actually watch.
Disney Plus
If you were like me, you were full of excitement when you first logged on to Disney Plus, only to be quickly overwhelmed by the amount of choice and no real direction of what to watch.
Recommended
The top banner on Disney Plus rolls to show recommendations of shows and movies you might want to watch. However, since at the moment the vast majority of its content is back catalogue, there’s little new content to feature on here apart from some behind-the-scenes shows and documentaries.
Categories
The biggest division on Disney Plus comes from the five studios that exist under the Disney umbrella, and so content can be split out into traditional Disney, Pixar, Marvel Studios, Star Wars and National Geographic, the largest bank of which is of course classic Disney.
Disney is separated into Originals, Walt Disney Animation Studios, Additional animated movies, Live Action, Disney Channel Series, ‘90s Throwbacks, Disney Channel Original Movies, Mickey Mouse Through the Years, Princesses and Fairy Tales, Disney Junior Series, Disneynature, and finally Vintage Disney.
Watch Next
Disney movies, Marvel movies and Star Wars episodes make up some of the most popular and the most binge-worthy film franchises in history. You’d think that Disney+ would know that you intend to watch the next in the series, but unfortunately, its ‘Watch Next’ option isn’t as intuitive as I’d like it to be.
For instance, after watching Thor: The Dark World, Disney Plus offers up these films to watch next, when the next instalment in the MCU is actually Captain America: Winter Soldier.
Collections
These are great playlists compiled of some of Disney’s most popular films and TV episodes, including the Toy Story Collection, The Frozen Collection and Disney Through the Decades.
Watchlist
Again, for some reason Disney Plus doesn’t prominently feature your watchlist on the homepage, instead forcing you to navigate to it through the top or side menu. This makes it a slow process when selecting to watch the next instalment of your favourite show or rewatch the next Disney Classic that you saved for later.
Amazon Prime
With so much content available to stream on Amazon Prime, finding your way around can be a bit confusing.
Amazon Originals
Not surprisingly, Amazon serves up its original content first just like Netflix. Although, unlike Netflix, it’s displayed in a simple horizontal list to scroll through, rather than featuring a particular series of films in its spotlight.
Spotlight
Amazon Prime does feature a banner at the top spotlighting a selection of content, the problem being there’s little-to-no connection between the content it serves. It’s not based on your viewing habits, it's not exclusive to Amazon Originals and there can be as many as 14 recommendations to scroll through. This doesn’t exactly fine-tune your selection.
Recommended
Prime’s 'Movies we think you’ll like’ are a bit of a mystery to me. I was served every single Jurassic Park movie alongside Chicken Run and Playmobil the Movie. This could do with some fine-tuning to offer content that’s more similar to what I’ve previously watched.
Netflix is the easiest streaming platform to use
While I enjoy all of these platforms, Netflix is by far the easiest to use. It has a more intuitive design, recommendations and streamlined setup that makes it easier and quicker to find the next show you want to binge.
