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YouTube TV has been available as a cord-cutting TV subscription option for a few years, but one big feature has been missing – 4K. For one reason or another, 4K streaming has not been available, but the company has announced that’s all changing with YouTube TV 4K Plus.
Instead of just including 4K streaming for YouTube TV subscribers, you’ll now have to pay an extra $9.99 per month (with a catch) to gain this functionality. After adding the feature, a new 4K icon will appear as you look around for something to watch, and will also be visible in the Live section of the YouTube TV app. The app will even make it possible for you to simply search for 4K content if you want to show off your TV or just don’t feel like dealing with 1080p content. At launch, the following channels are the first to provide 4K streaming channels and on-demand content:
- Discovery
- ESPN
- FOX Sports
- FX
- National Geographic (Nat Geo)
- NBC Sports
- Tastemade
Thankfully, there are a couple of other new features coming to YouTube TV as part of this new 4K Plus subscription. The first of which is the ability to watch any content that was saved to your DVR for offline viewing via the iOS and Android app. Being able to catch up on a show without having to waste data by streaming, and watching it from your smartphone is another feature that feels like it should have been there at launch. But hey, it’s here now.
The last big feature arriving with YouTube TV 4K Plus is the ability to have an unlimited number of streams going on at one time. Previously, this was limited to three streams at the same time, but Google does state that those devices must be on “your home WiFi”. Otherwise, the three-device limit will remain in place, even if you added the 4K Plus subscription to your YouTube TV bill.
So what’s the catch? In the blog post, it was confirmed that YouTube TV subscribers can sign up for a 30-day free trial of 4K Plus. After that trial is completed, this can be purchased as an add-on to your current subscription for $9.99 per month. That $10 per month rate will only be good for one year before YouTube TV will up the cost to $19.99 per month going forward. So that will bring the total cost of your YouTube TV subscription up to a whopping $85 per month, just for the luxury of watching 4K content.
If you want to sign up for YouTube TV 4K Plus, you can do so today by heading into the settings of your YouTube TV app. Or you can head over to tv.youtube.com, head into Settings, and then select 4K Plus from the Membership tab.
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