Watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer, 25 Years Later

March 10 marked the 25th anniversary of the debut of the cult television phenomenon Buffy the Vampire Slayer. When Buffy Summers arrived on the small screen, a follow-up of the somewhat more lackluster 1992 film of the same name, she and her Scooby gang quickly stabbed a special place in fans’ hearts. Now, 25 years later, the show still has a cult appeal and is building a new generation of fans (even if you acknowledge the cheesy special effects, sometimes outdated content, and problematic creator). Buffy, known for its witty dialogue and strong female lead, helped to establish the WB and CW as hubs for teen drama and supernatural series. The somewhat goofy series about a 16-year-old California girl given the powers to fight demons and monsters spawned dozens of extended story and inter-universe comic books, as well as a second series Angel, not to mention entire academic courses on its pop culture significance. Its allegorical storytelling of the travails of high school and young adult life was never subtle, but still struck a powerful chord in the collective consciousness, and was taken to heart by many. It was a juggernaut to be sure. Read on for more on how to watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

• How Many Seasons: Buffy the Vampire Slayer ran for 7 seasons, and Angel for 5 seasons.
• Where to Watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer: All of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel are available to stream on Hulu’s digital library (30-Day Free Trial), Amazon Prime Video (free trial), and The Roku Channel.

How to Watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer

While Buffy the Vampire Slayer has been off the air since 2003, it has almost constantly been available to view in one form or another. Below you can find the streaming services that carry all 7 seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, as well as all 5 seasons of the series spinoff Angel. Happy hunting, Scoobies!

Watch Buffy on Prime Video

All of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel is on Amazon’s Prime Video platform. Suppose you aren’t a subscriber to Prime Video. Don’t worry. Just sign up for a free trial to Amazon Prime, and you can try out Buffy for free!

The service costs $14.99 per month after the free trial, but you won’t be charged if you cancel before the trial expires. While a subscription to Amazon Prime provides access to thousands of movies and TV shows through Prime video, there are also a ton of other benefits like free shipping on prime eligible purchases on Amazon. You can learn more about the other benefits of Prime in our review of Amazon Prime.

Amazon Prime video is supported on the following devices:

• Amazon Fire TV
• Amazon Fire TV Stick and Stick Like
• Amazon Fire Stick 4K
• Google Chromecast
• Roku
• Apple TV
• and many more

Watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer on Hulu

All of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel is also available to stream through the Hulu subscription service as part of its on-demand digital library. Not yet a Hulu subscriber? Hulu offers a free trial month and several different monthly plans. All of them will allow you to watch Buffy. The plans are listed below:

• Hulu (with ads): This plan costs $7.99 per month but provides an annual billing option priced at a discount. This plan is ad-supported.
• Hulu (no ads): This plan costs $14.99 per month. With this plan, you get all the movies and TV shows in Hulu’s streaming library commercial-free. (Due to network arrangements, Grey’s Anatomy, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and How To Get Away With Murder will always have commercials).

Hulu is supported on Roku, Amazon Fire TV, Apple TV, Google Chromecast, and more. For more information on the service features and device support, please see our in-depth review of Hulu.

Watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer on The Roku Channel

The Roku Channel is a free app for cord-cutters, offering tons of free movies and TV, as well as a way to add subscriptions to premium services like HBO, Starz, and Showtime. It carries all of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel seasons, however, they have commercial breaks. All free movies and TV shows on The Roku Channel are ad-supported. However, expect about half the quantity of the ads view experience on traditional cable TV. Given that an hour of TV on most networks comes with roughly 16 minutes of commercials expect around 8 minutes of commercials per hour when watching free content on the “The Roku Channel.” You can read our review of The Roku Channel for more.