How To Watch College Football Without Cable

College football TV rights are distributed based on the conference and spread over a dozen different networks. This article will help you find the best streaming service to watch college football in 2021, and I’ll update this article weekly with where you can watch college football games every week without cable.

How To Stream College Football Bowl Games and Championships

Below are the college games airing this week and where you can watch them, even if you don’t have cable.

(all time eastern)

College Football Bowl Schedule

The list below links guides to watching every bowl game without cable.

Best Option For Watching Bowl Games – We recommend DIRECTV STREAM (5-day free trial). They offer all the channels you need to watch every college bowl game! This would provide 2 full weeks of bowl games for free!

• Friday, Dec. 31
  • Orange Bowl (College Football Playoff semifinal) – No. 2 Michigan vs. No. 3 Georgia at 7:30 p.m. on ESPN
• Saturday, Jan. 1
  • Outback Bowl – Arkansas vs. Penn State at 12 p.m. on ESPN2
  • Citrus Bowl – Iowa vs. Kentucky at 1 p.m. on ABC
  • Fiesta Bowl – Notre Dame vs. Oklahoma State at 1 p.m. on ESPN
  • Rose Bowl – Ohio State vs. Utah at 5 p.m. on ESPN
  • Sugar Bowl – Baylor vs. Ole Miss at 8:45 p.m. on ESPN
• Tuesday, Jan. 4
  • Texas Bowl – Kansas State vs. LSU at 9 p.m. on ESPN
• Monday, Jan. 10
  • College Football Playoff National Championship Game at 8 p.m. on ESPN

Best Way to Watch College Football Online

Below are various streaming services that provide the channels you need to watch college football throughout the 2021 season.

DIRECTV STREAM

DIRECTV STREAM – DIRECTV STREAM offers various channel plans. Below I’ll describe which channels airing college football are included with each plan. We recommend signing up for DIRECTV STREAM this bowl season as the service provides a way to college bowl games for the next two weeks free! While the service starts at $69.99 per month, they provide a 5-day free trial. If you enjoy the service, you can continue DIRECTV STREAM month-to-month. They don’t force you into a contract so that you can cancel at any time. All DIRECTV STREAM channel plans are described below:

The “Entertainment” package is the base plan for $69.99 per month and offers the following channels carrying college football:

• FOX
• NBC
• CBS
• ABC
• ESPN
• ESPN2
• FS1

If you upgrade to the “Choice” Plan for $89.99 per month, you add the following relevant college football channels:

• BTN
• ESPNU
• SEC Network
• ACC Network
• Longhorn Network

If you upgrade to the “Ultimate” Plan for $104.99 per month, you add the following relevant college football channels:

• CBS Sports Network
• FS2

DIRECTV STREAM is supported on AppleTV, Android TV, Roku, Amazon FireTV, and more. You can check out everything this service offers by signing up. You can also read more about this streaming service in our DIRECTV STREAM review.

fuboTV

FuboTV – FuboTV offers nearly every channel you need for NCAA college football.  FuboTV also offers a 1-week free trial. After the free trial, the fuboTV Pro Plan costs $$$ per month and includes the following channels for watching college football:

• ABC
• CBS
• NBC
• FOX
• NBC Sports Network
• CBS Sports Network
• ESPN
• ESPN2
• ESPN3 (Through the ESPN app)
• FS1
• FS2
• BTN (Big Ten Network)

If you add the “Sports Plus” channel pack for an additional $10.99 per month, you will also receive the following channels:

• ESPNU
• SEC Network
• ACC Network
• PAC-12 Network (Includes regional Pac-12 Networks)
• Stadium

To watch games on Next Level Sports, you will need to add the fuboTV International Sports add-on for an additional $6.99 per month.

The FuboTV app is available on major platforms, including AppleTV, AndroidTV, Roku, and Amazon FireTV. We also have a full review of FuboTV for more details on their service. To see all the channels you can receive through FuboTV in your area, check out this link.

ESPN+

If you are interested in watching games in smaller conferences, you should check out ESPN+. This is ESPN’s premium service, and each week ESPN+ will have exclusive coverage of hundreds of college football games. Throughout the 2021 college football season, ESPN+ will stream over 500 games including the following:

• SEC: ~14 games, one from each school
• Big 12: ~13-17 games
• Group of 5: 127 games (24 ACC Games, 35 CUSA games, 28 MAC games, 34 Sun Belt games, 6 Independent games)
• FCS: 350+ games from 10 conferences, exclusive coverage excluding select games

ESPN+ is also available to subscribers who want to bundle ESPN+ with Disney+ and Hulu’s streaming library. All three services together are just $13.99 per month.

Check out our review of ESPN+ for more details.

Hulu Live TV

Hulu TV is Hulu Live TV. Hulu Live TV provides access to most of the cable channels you need for college football and offers local broadcast channels in most TV markets. Here are all the channels carrying college football you get with Hulu Live TV:

• ABC
• FOX
• CBS
• NBC
• ESPN
• ESPN2
• ESPN3 (Through the ESPN app)
• ESPNU
• ACC Network
• FS1
• FS2
• SEC Network
• BTN
• and CBS Sports

Hulu + Live TV is supported on Roku, Fire TV Devices, Apple TV, Chromecast, Xbox One, iOS, Android, and more. Check out our review of Hulu Live TV to see if they are right for you, or check out their 1-week free trial. The only college networks missing from their lineup are the Pac-12 Network, Longhorn Network, and Eleven Sports. 

Sling TV

Sling TV – Sling TV is the service to grab if you must have Pac-12. However, you will be missing BTN and CBS Sports Network. To get the most college football on Sling TV, pick up both the Orange and the Blue package with the “Sports Extra” add-on for $65 per month. Sling provides access to:

• ESPN
• ESPN2
• ESPN3
• ESPNU
• FS1
• FS2,
• Pac-12 Network
• ACC Network
• SEC Network
• BTN
• Longhorn Network
• Stadium

This will also provide NBC and Fox in specific markets, but most will need to find a way to watch games on ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC. CBS Sports Network and Eleven Sports are also missing from Sling TV’s lineup. Sling TV is supported on Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Chromecast, and more, so it’s not a problem to enjoy it on a TV, tablet, computer, or other smart devices. Before you sign up for a subscription to Sling, be sure to look at our full review of Sling TV for more details on the service.

College Football Games Not On TV

Here are some options for games you won’t find on TV or ESPN+.

BTN Plus

BTN also offers a service called BTN Plus, which lets you watch over 1400 non-televised games college football games on Roku, Fire TV, Android, and iOS devices. This way, you get plenty of content for all schools in the Big Ten Conference. You can view these games on the BTN Plus app for $14.95/month or $119.95/year. This service unlocks all non-televised games from the following schools:

• University of Michigan
• Northwestern University
• Wisconsin University
• The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
• Penn State University
• Ohio State University
• Michigan State University
• Purdue University
• University of Minnesota
• Indiana University
• University of Iowa
• University of Nebraska
• Rutgers University
• University of Maryland

If you just want to watch one school, you can get the “School Pass” for $9.95 / month or $79.95 for the year. Remember, this will only provide access to that school games not being televised that week.

College Sports Live

If your team doesn’t air on channels from any of the services above, give College Sports Live a try. It starts at $9.95 per month. They have deals with schools including Air Force, Baylor, Georgetown, Georgia, Minnesota, Navy, Oakland, Ohio State, Penn State, Pittsburgh, Purdue, Rice, San Diego State, UConn, Villanova, Virginia, etc. If a game isn’t being televised on a national network, there is a fairly good chance you can find the game on College Sports Live.