BT’s three sport channels are now available to all BT TV customers regardless of their broadband package.
The channels are available for free to all BT broadband customers but, until today, a customer’s broadband package dictated how they could watch the channels.
Since launching last August, BT Sport 1, BT Sport 2 and ESPN have been available as streamed channels to BT’s flagship YouView set top boxes and older Vision+ boxes for customers who have an an Infinity (fibre) broadband connection.
Initially some customers outside the Infinity network’s coverage area were able to receive BT Sport 1 and BT Sport 2 via their aerial on Vision+ boxes. However, earlier this year, BT stopped selling new subscriptions for the aerial versions.
This left customers without Infinity restricted to viewing on BT.com or via the firm’s smartphone and tablet app which can beamed to a TV using Apple’s Airplay or Google’s Chromecast services.
The inability to offer BT Sport to users without an Infinity connection made BT’s TV offering complex and difficult for existing and potential customers to understand.
In a bod to simplify the number of options and increase the channels’ availability, BT is now making the Standard Definition versions available via copper (ADSL) broadband to “new and existing BT broadband customers who can’t get Infinity” provided their line delivers speeds of at least 6.5Mbps.
Customers who want to watch in HD or to add BT’s package of pay-TV channels will still need Infinity.
The firm’s help pages advise customers accessing the channels via ADSL broadband “will be able to use trick play on the BT Sport channels including pause, rewind and fast forward” but will be limited to watching or recording one BT Sport channel at a time.
