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Free legal services, the film library your library card already pays for, and an honest account of what a cheaper tier takes away.

There are no prices in this section, and that is deliberate. Streaming prices change several times a year, and a maintained article that quotes a figure is wrong within months while continuing to rank. What is stable is the structure: what an advertising tier removes, which titles are excluded from it, whether downloads survive, and what happens to your profiles and viewing history when you cancel. Those answers hold long enough to be worth writing down.

The free services are the part most people underestimate. Tubi, Pluto TV, Roku's own channel and Plex carry real catalogues, legally, funded by advertising, with no account required on several of them. Kanopy and Hoopla run through public and university libraries, and between them cover a large amount of what a paid arthouse subscription offers, for the cost of a library card you may already hold.

We do not cover ways of getting paid content without paying for it, and we do not link to them.