You can also browse programmes by channels (BBC One, BBC Two or CBeebies, for example), categories (Arts, Food and Documentaries, say) or TV guide schedules.

The service dynamically highlights programmes, too, mixing documentaries and comedy panel shows so that there’s something for everyone.

Best media streamers: the best TV streaming devicesīBC iPlayer’s familiar grid layout is neat and stylish, with its home screen logically presenting you with 'Featured', 'Recommended for You', 'Continue Watching' and 'Most Popular' suggestions.

You can choose whether to restrict downloading to when you're connected to a wi-fi network or allow downloading over your mobile network data in the app's settings.

This is great for long train journeys, if you’re travelling out of the country (iPlayer is only available in the UK) or can’t get any internet or data signal. It would be difficult to guess how many hours of content iPlayer offers at any one time, but there always seems to be at least one show on iPlayer that everyone is talking about – and that's a credit to the broadcaster's consistency for quality programming.Īs with many streaming services these days, BBC iPlayer lets you download shows onto your smart device for offline watching for up to 30 days. The 'from the archive' tab in 'categories' is where you’ll find full series’ of classic fare such as Absolutely Fabulous, Blackadder and The Vicar of Dibley as well as pretty much every Michael Palin documentary ever made. In a bid to boost the nation's spirits during lockdown, the BBC helpfully added a slew of new long-term boxsets to iPlayer. BBC iPlayer does host some of its most popular TV shows for longer durations, however – Killing Eve (which became the first British-made show to be named the best comedy series at the Emmy Awards last year), Line of Duty (multiple BAFTA Television Awards nominee) and Luther (multiple Golden Globe nominee) are, at the time of writing, available to binge in their entirety on iPlayer, for example.

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