Photo: Mirko Kuzmanovic (Shutterstock)
Didn’t we just have an Olympics? Yes—but the 2020 Summer Games were booted into 2021 by COVID, so we’re back here again already. The 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics (or the Second Global Pandemic Games, if you prefer a bit of post-apocalyptic flair) kick off on Friday, Feb. 4 and run through Sunday, Feb. 20, and are set to be historic for a number of reasons.
First, the Games will include seven new events in their 109-event program. As noted, these are the second Olympics to have to content with the coronavirus, and foreign spectators are once again banned from traveling and watching the Games in person. Finally, and for the first time ever, you won’t need a cable subscription to catch all of the action.
NBC announced Wednesday that it will stream all of the upcoming Winter Games in Beijing on Peacock, the network’s subscription-based streaming platform. Peacock will be the comprehensive place to access every second of coverage across all 15 sports, but you have other options to watch your favorite events as well. Below we’ve rounded up all the ways for you to tune into this year’s Olympic Games from the comfort of your home.
If you want to watch on network TV
NBCUniversal is the exclusive official Olympics broadcaster, meaning your local NBC station will be the only place to watch the Games via network TV.
While exact details have yet to be released, history tells us that NBCUniversal’s competition coverage will begin on Wednesday, Feb. 2 (two days before the opening ceremony). Given the time difference, NBC will likely air the opening ceremony live from Beijing before rebroadcasting it during primetime in the US.
If you want to stream the Games
This year, Peacock is the hub for all Olympic content. Full access to every second of the Winter Games is only available to subscribers of the Premium ($4.99/month, includes ads) and Premium Plus ($9.99/month, no ads) tiers of Peacock. This access includes the opening and closing ceremonies, NBC’s nightly primetime show for the Winter Olympics, full replays of all competition available immediately upon conclusion, exclusive daily studio programming, medal ceremonies, highlight clips and more.
The Peacock app is available online as well as through services like Amazon Fire, Roku, Apple TV or Android TV. The service offers a free trial, but it only lasts a week, so you can’t catch all of the Games without paying for at least one month.
If you want to stream (but not download anything new)
If you don’t have the Peacock app, you can use other subscription-based streaming services, as long as they include access to NBCUniversal channels. This means Hulu + Live TV, Spectrum, SLING TV and Fubo TV should all have access to the main events.
In 2021 Amazon’s Fire TV offered a special landing page on the home screen that combined all the ways to watch the Olympics, but it’s unclear yet if they’ll offer the same format again.
If you want to watch on-the-go
The NBC Sports app and NBCOlympics.com are currently streaming coverage of the Olympic Trials, and it follows that they’ll offer live coverage during the Games. However, in order to fully access Olympics content through these venues, you need to be a paid subscriber to an NBC-partner satellite, cable, or streaming service (like Hulu+Live TV and all the others listed above).
If you want to watch for free
If you aren’t subscribed to any streaming platforms (or you’ve run out of free trials), go straight to the source with the Olympic Channel on olympics.com. When it gets closer to the Games, YouTube’s official Olympics channel might also offer coverage and replays of select events.
If you want to watch in Spanish
Last year the NBCUniversal Spanish-language networks Telemundo and Universo aired Olympics programming, which was also available to stream on the Telemundo Deportes website and app.
If you’re wondering whether the Games will be delayed or canceled because of the pandemic...
Here’s what the New York Times reports:
Anything is possible, but the International Olympic Committee and Olympic organizers in Beijing have gone out of their way to emphasize that the Games will go on as planned. Asked in early December whether he could envision a situation in which the Games had to be postponed, Juan Antonio Samaranch, a top Olympic official, was blunt. “The answer is no,” he said. “In a Covid world, you have to be flexible, and you have to be able to adapt rapidly to changing conditions. We have that in Beijing.”
It looks like these Games are happening no matter what.
Too lazy, didn’t read
If you want comprehensive coverage of the 2022 Winter Olympics, NBC clearly wants you to subscribe to Peacock, which is, at least, a lot cheaper than paying for cable. If you don’t want to subscribe to Peacock, you’ll still have access to live streams like the Olympic Channel.
Check out NBC’s Beijing 2022 schedule for more details on how and when to tune into your favorite sports this year. You can also turn to the competition schedule on the Olympics’ site to see what events will occur on which days, as well as when all medal events will be held. Go team.
