Where to Legally Download or Stream Movies for Free
If you’ve watched everything on Netflix and Hulu during quarantine—or you don’t have a friend or family member’s streaming service account to mooch off of—there are plenty of ways to stream other awesome shows and movies online. We’re talking about free content, we should note; why pay to watch movies and TV shows if you don’t have to?
Here are 16 great sites to bookmark for when you want something new to watch. Note that many films are available on multiple free services at once, so if your movie has too many commercial interruptions or a painfully low resolution on one of them, search for it on another.
Kanopy and Hoopla
The streaming services Kanopy and Hoopla both have a large selection of high-quality movies—Kanopy carries the Criterion Collection—but they’re only available if your local library system has a subscription, which also means you’ll need a valid library account to log in. That’s one more hoop you’ll have to jump through, but it’s worth it considering the variety of what’s available.
Check on either site to see if you can access them via your existing (and free) library account.
PBS
PBS is home to shows like PBS Newshour, Antiques Roadshow and This Old House. While many titles are restricted to paying members, some of PBS’s online selection (taken from its TV programming) is available online for free, including a series of film school shorts. Depending on the show, you may be able to view certain episodes or previews without a subscription. That’s not as great as a full, free season, but it’s enough to get by.
Tubi
Free streaming site Tubi offers movies and TV shows from several major studios with minimal (sometimes zero) advertising. The catch is that—judging by a spot-check—desktop streaming is limited to SD resolutions.
The wide range of titles includes Harold and Maude, Heathers, Rain Man, Road to Perdition, The September Issue and The Big Short. There are several genre lists to help you browse the large catalog, and there’s even a dedicated section called “Not on Netflix” so you can get your Dance Moms and Bachelorette fix.
Tubi is available for desktop as well as Android, iOS, Roku and Amazon Fire.
MoviesFoundOnline
MoviesFoundOnline collects public domain films, independent films, stand-up comedy, TV shows and other media freely available around the web. Content is organized by categories, which are easy to browse across the top of the site. Highlights range from cult classics like Dawn of the Dead and Reefer Madness to more recent films like The Expendables and Starship Troopers.
It’s worth pointing out that since MoviesFoundOnline doesn’t upload or host the media themselves, some of it may wind up vanishing if a copyright claim is made against it. As long as you can stream them, though, you’ll get a lot of great, freely available and difficult-to-find movies and TV recordings for the low price of nothing.
Vudu
Paid streaming service Vudu has a free section offering an assortment of recognizable movies floating among less familiar titles. You’ll need to sign up for a free account and sit through some ads—and some movies are only available in SD, which isn’t great—but you’ll get access to more than 5, movies on your computer, phone or streaming device.
You’ll find a lot of films from the ‘80s and ‘90s (as the rights to supply them have gotten cheaper), but Vudu has also added decent amount of of recent titles. Highlights from the current lineup include The Exorcist, The Royal Tenenbaums, Get Shorty, Waiting for Guffman and O Brother, Where Art Thou?
IMDb TV
Many free streaming services are packed with movies you’ve never heard of, so you need to sift through them or find the “Most Popular” section to get to the good stuff. But IMDb TV, a free portal for watching TV and movies, focuses on recognizable titles. You’ll have to create an IMDb account and watch occasional ads to access them, but that’s a small price to pay for a not-too-shabby lineup.
IMDb TV is available for desktop streaming and Amazon Fire TV devices. Current titles include A League of Their Own, Varsity Blues, A Knight’s Tale, The NeverEnding Story, Spotlight, The Big Short, Memento, Donnie Darko, Funny Girl and Airplane.
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