Irish TV Channels Over Broadband: The Full Picture

Irish television reaches a screen three ways now. Over the air through Saorview, which is free and covers RTE One, RTE2, RTE News, RTE Junior, Virgin Media One to Four and TG4. Through the broadcasters own apps, which are free but cover only their own programmes and usually only inside Ireland. Or through a subscription that carries Irish channels alongside UK channels, sport and a film library on one login. EmeraldIPTV is the third kind, at €12 a month with a 24-hour free trial first.

Which one you want depends on an honest answer to a simple question: do you watch anything beyond the Irish terrestrial channels? If the answer is no, Saorview is genuinely the right choice and costs nothing. If the answer is yes, and for most households it is, this page explains what the paid option adds and where the limits are.

How to Get Free TV Channels in Ireland

Start with what is free, because plenty of households are paying for something they could have for nothing. Ireland has two free platforms and a set of free apps.

• Saorview. The Irish digital terrestrial platform. An aerial plus a Saorview-approved receiver, or any modern television with a built-in tuner, gets you the Irish channels with no monthly charge.
• Saorsat. The satellite version, built for the homes that cannot receive Saorview by aerial, which mostly means parts of the coast and the hillier counties.
• Broadcaster apps. RTE Player and the Virgin Media player carry their own channels and catch-up over broadband. They are free, and inside Ireland they cover a lot of ordinary viewing.

The catch is scope. None of those gives you the UK channels most Irish homes watch, none carries the subscription sport channels, and the apps are generally limited to viewers in Ireland. A household that only ever watches RTE and Virgin Media should stop reading here and put up an aerial. Everyone else is choosing between a television package and a subscription like this one.

What the Irish Line-Up Covers

The Irish section of an EmeraldIPTV line sits alongside the UK terrestrial channels, because that is how Irish households actually watch. The grouping in the app follows the same logic.

Specific channel names are listed on the channel list page rather than scattered through the prose here, because line-ups change and a page full of names goes stale. The reliable way to check is the trial: open the channels you care about and see them working.

Watching Irish Television Abroad

This is one of the most common reasons Irish people go looking for a service like this. Family in Boston, Sydney, Dubai or Birmingham who want RTE on a Sunday, or who want TG4 for the language, and find the broadcaster apps geographically restricted.

An IPTV subscription is not geographically restricted in the same way, because it delivers over broadband rather than from an Irish transmitter. The login that works on a television in Cork works on a television in Toronto on the same terms. Nothing is posted, nothing is installed and the channel list looks identical.

Two practical points. First, broadband abroad varies, so the speed guidance on the IPTV Ireland page applies wherever you are. Second, a one-screen plan is one stream at a time, so a household split between two countries needs two screens rather than one.

For the Irish language specifically, TG4 is the reason a lot of families abroad keep a subscription going. It is the one channel that has no real substitute anywhere else.

Devices That Suit Irish Households

Any device that runs a player app will do, and most homes already own one. What follows is the order of least hassle rather than a ranking of quality.

1. An Amazon Fire TV Stick. Cheap, small, and the most common starting point in Irish homes. The Firestick guide walks through it.
2. An Android TV box or stick. More storage and often an Ethernet port, which matters where Wi-Fi is weak. See the Android TV guide.
3. A Samsung or LG smart television. No extra hardware at all if the television is recent enough. Guides for Samsung and LG.
4. An Apple TV, iPhone or iPad. Covered in the Apple guide.
5. A MAG or Formuler box. The traditional choice, still popular with people who want a remote that does one job. See the box guide.

Whatever you use, buy it from an ordinary retailer and install the player yourself. Hardware sold already loaded with subscriptions is the arrangement that gets sellers into trouble here, and it leaves you with a box you cannot update or fix.