Watch TV for Free on your iPad
Now that all the big players have released TV catchup service apps for the iPad it is time for me to take a look at them all and give you a rundown of the best. All the apps are free and work via wifi internet connection. Apps all tested on an iPad 2 with an 8mb internet connection. All apps work with original iPad. Your internet connection may vary.
ITV Player
ITV Player has a nice black, blue and white design with sections of Most Watched, Don’t Miss and channels ITV1, ITV2, ITV3 and ITV4. Programmes are available for up to only 7 days after airing. Also offers an A-Z listing of shows and a search function. The quality of the TV stream is not the best and occasionally you may get buffering problems and also the picture sometimes is not as clear as it can be and can appear pixelated and blurry. Some shows have a parental guidance on them but there appears to be no parental lock. 7/10
4 OD Catchup
This app is the offering from Channel 4. It has an easy on the eye blue design and the app opens with a selection of recommended programmes to watch from channel 4. E4 and More 4. It offers an excellent 30 day viewing window so you are not rushed to watch a show. The quality of the stream is excellent and I experienced no issues with the app. This app has an optional parental lock with use of a pin number if you wish to lock your childs viewing. 9/10
Demand 5
Channel 5’s offering started out as a test app for viewing Big Brother and has now become a fully fledged catchup app. It covers an excellent 30 days of viewing shows with a simple purple and grey navigation which like the others easy to use. The app is sponsored by Currys PC world with a small banner in the app, there is also a PC world advert prior to some shows viewing but really it is not intrusive at all. It also has some older shows broadcast months ago. The app description says shows are viewable for 30 days but I found some shows were viewable for up to a year. Channel 5 does not have a lot of content which is why I think it has some back episodes of shows to bulk it out a bit. Good quality internet stream 8/10
BBC iPlayer
The original and best of the catchup services, the BBC iPlayer by its very nature of TV and Radio has the most content of all apps. It covers catchup programmes from BBC1, BBC2, BBC3, BBC4, CBBC, Cbeebies, BBC News and BBC Parliament plus all of the available digital BBC radio stations. Internet streams are of excellent quality and the app has a nice design in both portrait and landscape modes with channel listings and a search function. Oddly, and unlike the desktop version it does not appear to have a parental lock but it does have a favourites function to add a series so a new episode will be automatically listed in the favourites section. Excellent stream, best content but no parental lock, also shows generally are available for only up to 7 days which is a bit disappointing 9/10