If you don’t want to pay for streaming video, you have many choices. One of them is Amazon Freevee (formerly known as IMDb TV), a free, easy-to-access service that's available on many platforms. It features a decent movie library, too. That said, it has lackluster original content, and the navigation experience could use improvement. Overall, Amazon Freevee doesn't surpass the best free streaming services, including our robust Editors' Choice pick Peacock, but it’s still a worthwhile service for no-cost entertainment.
What Can I Watch On Amazon Freevee?
Amazon Freevee has a varied movie selection, but the television options could be better. In terms of total library size, Freevee can't compete with Peacock’s 13,000 hours’ worth of streaming content for free members. Crackle has more than 700 movies and 100 TV shows. Pluto.tv has 250+ channels of free TV, and thousands of on-demand movies and TV shows. Plex, The Roku Channel, Tubi, and Vudu also offer substantial libraries of free streaming content.
Like other streaming services, Freevee's library fluctuates. Former recognizable and exciting shows, such as Schitt's Creek and Ugly Betty, have migrated to other services. Still, you can enjoy hit shows like Mad Men, My Name Is Earl, and The X-Files. Compare this thin lineup to what you can find on Peacock: 30 Rock, Blindspot, Cheers, Everybody Loves Raymond, Frasier, Friday Night Lights, Heroes, King of Queens, Parks and Recreation, Saturday Night Live, and Will and Grace.
There are some originals Amazon Freevee programs, but they haven’t attained cult status. One original that looks promising is You’re Not a Monster. This animated show follows the struggles of a para-therapist who takes on supernatural patients, such as a succubus and the ghost girl from The Ring. It’s perfect for a realistic, insightful Halloween, and for people who want scary inner truths instead of actual horror (which you can find on Shudder). Special Skills with Jay Pharoah is another Freevee original, but, as with You’re Not a Monster, episodes clock in at less than 10 minutes long.
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In comparison, Crackle’s original sci-fi series Spides has lengthy, 50-minute episodes that are packed with action and intrigue. Lennox Lewis is a Crackle original movie that has Dr. Dre narrating the life of the heavyweight champion. Paid services offer much higher-quality originals. For example, Netflix’s BoJack Horseman, The Crown, Mindhunter, Orange Is The New Black, Russian Doll, and Stranger Things are all highly acclaimed and popular shows. Netflix original movies, such as The Ballad of Buster Scruggs, El Camino: A Breaking Bad Story, The Irishman, and Roma, all enjoyed mainstream success, too.
Amazon Freevee's movie library is more competitive. Some recently added titles at the time of review include Fifty Shades of Grey, The Founder, The Invisible Man, Knives Out, Logan, The Photograph, Shark Tale, and Wanted.
Our list of best movie streaming services includes Hulu, Netflix, Peacock, and Tubi. Netflix distinguishes itself for its original content, Hulu for its extensive movie library, Peacock for its popular NBC network shows, and Tubi for its extensive library of ad-supported movies. The Criterion Channel and Mubi are excellent choices for cinephiles.
There’s not a lot of diversity highlighted in Freevee's movies or TV shows, aside from acknowledging certain history months. Check out the best video streaming services for celebrating Black art for better options.
The Freevee original library is set to expand, however. Amazon Studios, the same studio that produces Bosch, The Boys, and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel has pledged to develop high-quality originals for the free streaming service. This partnership includes the spy-thriller Alex Rider; a reimagining of the crime thriller Leverage; sequel series Bosch: Legacy; and the original movie Love, Accidentally starring Brenda Song.
Freevee doesn’t offer live TV or live sports streaming. It's "live" channels simply repeat popular episodes of daytime TV staples, such as Divorce Court and Unsolved Mysteries. If you want full access to Amazon’s sports content and extensive library, you have to pay for Prime Video.
Costs and Platforms
You have nothing to lose by trying Amazon Freevee: The service is ad-supported and free. All you need to do is sign up for an Amazon account.
Peacock is still one of our top picks in our roundup of the best free streaming service, with many more beloved shows and movies than other free streaming platforms. Crackle, Plex, The Roku Channel, Tubi, and Vudu also offer free, on-demand content. Pluto TV and Xumo offer free, preprogrammed TV channels.
Paid streaming platforms offer better originals and a wider library of content, but they can get pricey. For instance, Prime Video is $8.99 per month, Hulu costs $6.99 per month, and Disney+ is $7.99 per month. On the higher end of the pricing spectrum, Netflix’s Standard tier (the minimum we recommend) is $15.49 per month and HBO Max costs $14.99 per month.
Amazon Freevee is available on the web; mobile devices (Android and iOS); gaming platforms (PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S); streaming media devices (Apple TV, Chromecast, Fire TV, and Roku); smart TVs; set-top boxes; and Blu-ray players. You may still see the old IMDB TV branding.
Amazon Freevee on the Web and Mobile
Amazon Freevee has now been fully integrated into Amazon's Prime Video section as a distinct channel with the same content. The website is easy to navigate and pages quickly load. The only problem is the lack of genre division. Unlike other streaming services, Freevee doesn't have a fast option to access, for example, all of the service’s movies in the Action and Adventure or Documentaries section. Instead, you must go to the main page and scroll down to that section every time you want to see it, or search through all of Prime Video and filter out the paid programming.
While browsing through movies and shows, clicking on a title brought us right to its Amazon page, which has trailers and a summary. You can add a show to your watchlist, or leave a review or rating. However, chatting and watching a movie together with friends is limited to the premium Watch Party feature.
Freevee now has its own dedicated mobile apps. The app displays big pictures for popular movies and shows, as well as a list of trending searches and a live section. Selecting a show also presents you with seasons and episodes to browse. There's no thumbs-up or down buttons on content to better personalize your recommendations, but you can share what you're watching via social media. There's still no offline download feature, but thanks to the list of categories in the top nav bar, the offerings are more distinguishable by genre.
Amazon Freevee's playback interface has many expected features, such as volume, playback quality, and subtitles tools, and 10-second rewind and fast forward buttons. There are three levels of video quality: Good (uses about 0.38 GB per hour), Better (uses about 1.40 GB per hour), and Best (uses about 6.84 GB per hour). It doesn't show exact resolution, but even with the video quality set to Best, the picture quality remains slightly blurry in a way that makes us think it's near the lower end of HD. Maybe we've been spoiled by 4K and HDR, but the colors look a bit dull and gray. Freevee maintains Prime Video’s IMDb-powered X-Ray sidebar, which pinpoints the cast members in each scene, along with music tracks and random trivia.
We tested Freevee's streaming performance by watching Donnie Brasco (no longer available as of this writing). Playback started immediately, with only a five-second logo introduction. For that movie, which clocks in at two hours and seven minutes, there were nine sets of ads, each totaling 60 seconds. Nine minutes of ads for 127 minutes of movie isn't bad. We then decided to test a TV show to see if the ad experience was consistent. For one nearly 22-minute episode of 3rd Rock From the Sun, there were two ad breaks, each between 15 and 30 seconds. We also watched an episode of the original show, You’re Not A Monster. The stream had great HD quality (suggesting that quality really just depends on what you're watching), and we easily moved to the next episode by clicking the Next Episode button.
Accessibility and Parental Controls
All of the content we looked at offered closed captions, with subtitle customization. Some content supports Audio Descriptions. Apple TV+, Prime Video, and Netflix have this feature, which delivers audio narration for scene changes and character actions.
There’s no specified number of streams per account. Disney+, HBO Max, and Peacock let you fire up three simultaneous streams. BritBox supports five concurrent streams. You aren’t paying anything, so it doesn’t cost you anything to create a new account for every family member or friend, if necessary.
Freevee pulls from your Prime Video parental control settings when streaming on a Fire TV or Prime Video apps. However, there's nothing to stop kids from making their own free account to easily circumvent any restrictions you place. You also don’t know what ads you’ll get or if they’ll be kid-friendly. We recommend Disney+, HBO Max, and Netflix for parents looking to restrict their kids’ viewing options. These streaming services allow for multiple viewing profiles with individualized content restrictions.
Amazon Freevee and VPN
A virtual private network (VPN) is an easy way to secure your data online. When you enable a VPN, it routes all of your internet traffic through an encrypted tunnel between you and a remote server controlled by the VPN company, thus effectively masking your identity and location. That last benefit, in particular, can be troublesome for some video streaming services with geographic-restricted content. That’s why they may block VPN traffic altogether.
We tried to stream content from Amazon Freevee from a desktop PC connected to both a US- and Sweden-based Mullvad VPN server. The US-based server presented no problems, but we were unable to access the site over a connection to the Sweden-based server.
Even if you find that your VPN and video steaming service work for now, that’s no guarantee that they will continue to do so. Video streaming services are always finding new ways to block VPN traffic.
Video Streaming Services: What You Should Know
Free Video Streaming With Limited Options
Amazon Freevee offers a free streaming experience that has notable titles that might entertain you for a time, and the ads aren’t too lengthy or intrusive. However, you might find yourself drawn to other platforms for a more exciting library and better overall experience. Or just pay the extra money for the full-fledged Prime Video.
Our Editors' Choice pick for on-demand video streaming services is Netflix; its collection of popular original titles is unmatched. For streaming live TV, which Amazon Freevee lacks altogether, go with Hulu + Live TV or YouTube TV.
For more on streaming, check out five reasons to ditch your video subscription and keep cable. Learn how to pick streaming services that fit your budget, and enjoy all sorts of reality show trash. Finally, check out our recommended streaming video guides if you don’t know what to watch.
Amazon Freevee offers an impressive library of TV shows and movies, especially for a free, ad-supported streaming service. However, there are no-cost alternatives that offer more features and a greater content mix.
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