Is Peacock free? We breakdown what you get at the free tier

Peacock is often listed among free streaming services. Heck, we list it in our own such list here at Android Authority. But that’s not the full story. Peacock has paid tiers, and they’re not just ad-free versions of the same service. So, is Peacock free?

Read on for a breakdown of what the free version of Peacock is all about. And if you want to sign up, you can hit the link below.

Short answer: Is Peacock free?

The short answer is yes. Peacock is free. Or rather, there is a free tier of Peacock. It’s supported by brief ad breaks in the content you watch.

What that means is that you can watch some titles on Peacock without spending a penny. The revenue from the ads funds your streaming.

Now, the operative word here is “some.” There’s a lot of content you can’t access if you only use the free tier. So, let’s break that down and run through what is and, importantly, what is not free on Peacock.

Peacock’s ad-supported basic plan: an overview

Peacock actually has two paid plans. The two plans include the same access to all of Peacock’s content. That means that if you’re a paying customer, you have unlimited access.

See also: The best movies on Peacock

For $4.99 per month, you get Peacock Premium. Your unlimited access still includes ads with Premium, like with the free tier.

If you bump that up to a Peacock Premium Plus subscription for $9.99 per month, you get to drop all of the ads and continue to access anything you want on Peacock. You can cancel either plan at any time.

There is a lot to watch on Peacock even at the free tier.

One of the functions the free tier serves is as a kind of teaser for the paid subscriptions. A lot of the shows that require a Premium or Premium Plus subscription do offer free episodes.

There are shows available in their entirety for free too. All seasons of Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Battlestar Galactica, Superstore, Downton Abbey, and Columbo are free, for example. All 47 seasons of Saturday Night Live are available for free, and you can stay up to date with new episodes added weekly.

As mentioned above, some of the shows available for free on Peacock limit how much you can watch. So, while The Office and Parks and Recreation are free, you get cut off after those first two seasons and have to pay for more.

The Peacock originals are big omissions too. If you’re a free subscriber, you only get a brief taste of original shows, effectively just enough to let you decide if they’re worth upgrading to a paid tier for.

There are many movies off limits to free-tier users too. You may have heard, for instance, that you can watch the whole Harry Potter series on Peacock. That’s true, but it’s only available to paying subscribers. The same goes for plenty of newer titles as well as some classics and older films that vary from month to month.

Is the free plan even worth it?

It would be hard to argue that the Peacock free tier isn’t worth it. It’s free after all. You are paying for it by sitting through ads though. And you have to accept a limited library.

Where Peacock’s free tier really fails is in its limited access to Peacock original series. While having reduced access to movies and shows might make you lose interest in Peacock eventually, the way original shows are included forces you to either abandon them after one to three episodes or commit to a paid tier. In that way, free Peacock is almost like a teaser service.

So, whether it’s worth it depends on you. If you like having access to a few titles you won’t get anywhere else and you don’t mind ads, then Peacock’s free plan is absolutely worth it.

If you want to watch the MacGruber show or check out new Peacock original movies? Not so much.