With an above industry standard channel list for entertainment, sports, and news, Hulu + Live TV offers a little something for everyone. It’s famed for its huge range of channels and wide variety of on-demand content, allowing subscribers to enjoy TV shows, movies, sports events, news broadcasts, and more from a range of networks like Fox, ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, ESPN, and many more.
We break down everything there is to know about Hulu's channel list, so keep reading to learn about the range of Hulu channels, as well as bundles, add-ons, features, and more.
How does Hulu + Live TV work?
Hulu + Live TV is a pretty simple service to operate and can completely replace your need for a cable subscription. Users can subscribe for a monthly fee and get access to live TV channels, as well as access to the regular Hulu on-demand library, which features thousands of shows, movies, and more. All that makes Hulu one of the more complete solutions for cord-cutters.
Like other services, Hulu + Live TV lets you rewind, pause and fast-forward programs as well as record programs to its cloud DVR. Hulu’s live TV service is available on every major device platform, too.
Hulu is a great way to enjoy all the benefits of live TV and a streaming service in one great package. Plus, when you sign up for any Hulu + Live TV plan you'll get complete access to ESPN+ and Disney+. This gives subscribers even more amazing content to enjoy, including live sports and family-friendly movies and shows. Keep in mind though, there is only a Hulu free trial for the base package and not any live TV plans.
Complete Hulu + Live TV channels list
The Hulu channels list consists of over 85+ live tv networks.
- A&E
- ABC
- ABC News Live
- ACC Network
- Adult Swim
- Animal Planet
- BET
- Big Ten Network
- Bloomberg Television
- Bravo
- Cartoon Network
- CBS
- CBS News
- CBS Sports Network
- Cheddar News
- CMT
- CNBC
- CNN
- CNN International
- Comedy Central
- Comedy.TV
- Cozi TV
- Crime+Investigation
- CW
- Dabl
- Discovery Channel
- Disney Channel
- Disney Junior
- Disney XD
- E!
- ESPN
- ESPN 2
- ESPNEWS
- ESPNU
- ESPN College Extra
- Food Network
- Fox
- Fox Business
- Fox News Channel
- FS1
- FS2
- FreeForm
- FX
- FXM
- FXX
- FYI
- Golf Channel
- The Grio
- Hallmark
- Hallmark Movies &. Mysteries
- HGTV
- History
- HLN
- ID
- Justice Central TV
- Lifetime
- Lifetime Movies
- Localish
- Military History Chanel
- Motor Trend
- MSNBC
- MTV
- NASA
- National Geographic
- Nat Geo Wild
- NBC
- NBCLX
- NBC News NOW
- News Nation
- NFL Network
- Nickelodeon
- Nick Jr.
- OWN
- Oxygen
- Paramount Network
- Pop
- QVC
- SEC Network
- Smithsonian Channel
- Start TV
- SyFy
- TBS
- Turner Classic Movies
- Telemundo
- TLC
- TNT
- Travel Channel
- TruTV
- TVLand
- Universal Kids
- USA
- Vevo 80s
- Vevo 90s
- Vevo Country
- Vevo Hip Hop
- Vevo Holiday
- Vevo Pop
- VH1
- Vice
- Weather Channel
Add-ons for Hulu + Live TV
There are a few different add-on options that can expand the scope of your Hulu channels list. There is also feature add-ons like the Unlimited Screens add-on which costs $9.99/month and lets you stream on unlimited devices connected to your home network as well as 3 more on the go. However, if you subscribe to any premium channels through Hulu, like Showtime or STARZ, you will be limited to 5 screens in total, 3 of which can be on the go.
Sports add-on: $9.99/mo.
- FanDuel TV
- FanDuel Racing
- MAV TV
- NFL RedZone
- Outdoor Channel
- Sportsman Channel
Entertainment add-on: $7.99/mo.
- AHC
- BETher
- Boomerang
- CNBC World
- Cooking Channel
- Crime + Investigation
- Destination America
- Discovery Family
- Discovery Life
- Great American Family
- Hallmark Drama
- Magnolia
- Military History Channel
- MTV2
- MTV Classic
- Nick Toons
- Science Channel
- Teen Nick
Premium add-on Hulu channels
- HBO Max: $14.99/mo.
- Cinemax: $9.99/mo.
- Showtime: $10.99/mo.
- Starz: $8.99/mo.
Local channels
Hulu has tried very hard to work out (and maintain) deals with local ABC, CBS, Fox, and NBC stations. However, whether you can get them in your particular TV market can sometimes depends on where you live.
You can check the status of Hulu’s local coverage by entering your zip code on the Hulu site. If a network’s local affiliate isn’t available, you can still watch much of the network’s entertainment and news programming on demand. You won’t get local news or other local programs, though. And you won’t get the network’s sports broadcasts, either.
Entertainment channels
The Hulu + Live TV channel list includes a diverse range of entertainment options including shows geared towards kids and teens, repeats of syndicated shows, movies, documentaries and more.
Kids
Disney’s three kid-centric channels XD, Disney Jr and The Disney Channel lead a strong lineup of networks that appeal to kids of all ages. Sprout focuses on the toddler set while the animations on The Cartoon Network and Boomerang appeal to older kids and (if you stay up late enough) adults.
Pop and youth culture
Millennials and Gen Z are the target audience for channels like Oxygen, Freeform, Pop and Viceland.
After getting rebranded from ABC Family, the Freeform channel began pivoting towards younger audiences. The Bold Type follows staffers at a Cosmopolitan-like New York fashion mag while Shadowhunters follow New York’s young demon-hunting human-angel hybrids.
Pop’s mix of comedies includes rich-fish-out-of-water Schitt's Creek and fictional late-night show Nightcap. Viceland’s unscripted shows include skateboarder Rick McCrank’s Abandoned and beer master Meg Hill’s Beerland.
Oxygen uses a combination of true crime documentaries, mysteries and sisterhood programming to reach a young, multicultural female audience. For a more traditional approach to entertainment, E! and its popular E! News deliver celebrity gossip and other news from Hollywood.
Family TV
Families can turn to Bravo and Lifetime for a mix of reality TV and scripted entertainment programming. Bravo airs the trials and tribulations of the Real Housewives, cooking competition Top Chef and New York mommy comedy Odd Mom Out. Lifetime’s programming includes Project Runway and Designing Spaces.
Reliable repeats
Sometimes you want to turn to the predictable comfort of reruns. Between Friends, Seinfeld and Married… With Children, it’s a wonder TBS has time for original content. Fox’s FXX absorbs shows that don’t cut it on FX along with reruns of Parks and Recreation, Anger Management and The Simpsons. In between local programming, myNetwork TV repeats episodes of The X-Files and various Law & Order spinoffs.
Movies
Although Hulu’s on-demand catalog of movies offers more choice and flexibility, you can watch live streams of the latest movies showing on FXM, Lifetime Movies and TCM.
FXM features modern blockbusters like Taken, Transformers: Age of Extinction and Rise of the Planet of the Apes.
Lifetime Movies is a top entertainment destination for women, with movies like Stalked by My Doctor: The Return, Girlfriend Killer and Daughter for Sale.
Turner Classic Movies has a regular rotation of classics from silent films like the 1920s The Closet of Dr. Caligari, 1950s Run Silent, Run Deep, 1970s Eraserhead and 1980s The Princess Bride.
Reality and documentary networks
Over the past few years, the A&E and TruTV networks evolved their programming lineups from documentaries and fact-based series to a complete reliance on reality TV shows like Duck Dynasty and Hack My Life.
If food and kitchen renovation shows are your thing, you can watch Chopped on the Food Network, Kocktails with Khloé on fyi and Flip or Flop on HGTV.
But if you're looking for real reality content, you can catch the documentaries and fact-based programming on National Geographic, Nat Geo Wild, History and the Travel Channel.
Sports channels
Hulu’s sports lineup is fairly mainstream compared to sports-centric services like Fubo, but it makes up for it by having the biggest sports network in the world.
National sports networks
ESPN and its secondary channels like ESPN Goal Line, ESPN 2, ESPNews and ESPNU cover all of the major professional and collegiate sports. What ESPN doesn’t cover, you will probably find on Fox Sports, the NBC Sports Network, or the CBS Sports Network.
Hulu tries to make it as easy as possible for you to watch football. You can add the NFL—and your favorite team(s)—to your favorites list the same as you would a TV series, so upcoming games appear in your recommended list.
Regional sports networks
Hulu + Live TV will assign you to one of the Fox Sports Regional and Fox Sports Regional Plus channels. The major sports leagues are the ones who decide what teams people in different regions get to watch.
Neither you nor Hulu has a say in the matter, so Yankees fans living in Los Angeles will have to settle for the Anaheim Angels. It also means that people living in places like New Mexico without big-league teams end up having to watch the Diamondbacks instead of the Rockies.
Sports-specific networks
Hulu + Live TV has solid support for mainstream big-league sports but is not as good as services like fuboTV when it comes to airing niche sports. The handful of Hulu networks that focus on a specific sport or narrow category of sports doesn’t change that.
Diehard football fans or graduates of colleges in the SEC or Big Ten conferences will be happy to see the SEC and Big Ten TV networks on the Hulu channel list. If you went to school somewhere else, then you have to hope that one of the national networks has picked up your game.
The Golf Channel covers almost all of the major men’s and women’s golf tournaments. Unlike the big networks that only broadcast the last two days of a tournament, the Golf Channel provides hole-by-hole coverage of the Thursday and Friday rounds as well.
Winter sports fans can look forward to the Olympic Channel’s coverage of this winter’s Olympic Games from South Korea. For the first time, NBC will air its Olympic coverage live in all US time zones rather than tape-delaying results anybody can find on the web.
News channels
With Fox News on the right, MSNBC on the left and CNN shoring up the middle, you can get a balanced take on breaking national news. CNBC covers the latest news from Wall Street while CNN International conveys the global perspective. If all you need is a quick take on what’s happening now, HLN lets you hear the headlines.
Expanded content with Hulu on-demand
The Hulu + Live TV subscription includes access to on-demand content from more than two hundred studios. Besides the standard content from American providers, Hulu has on-demand collections for Spanish-speaking audiences, fans of British programming and anime enthusiasts.
Hulu’s original programming is one of the service’s biggest features. The latest episodes of award-winning shows like The Handmaid’s Tale and fan favorites like The Mindy Project don’t appear anywhere else.
Hulu + Live TV subscription plans
Hulu offers two options for watching its live TV service: Hulu + Live TV for $69.99/month and Hulu (No Ads) + Live TV for $82.99/month. Both plans include Disney+ and ESPN+, as well as unlimited cloud DVR.
It's important to note that "no ads" refers to Hulu's on-demand library only. Live programming still has commercials, just like regular TV.
When streaming an on-demand episode, subscribers to the ad-supported basic plan must sit through 4 to 5 commercial breaks in a typical one-hour TV show. Each break lasts anywhere from thirty to ninety seconds and can’t be skipped or fast-forwarded.
Read more about Hulu's plans and pricing.
Hulu + Live TV is a great choice
Hulu + Live TV is a good alternative to a cable subscription thanks to its lineup of live TV channels and its deep catalog of on-demand content. But which plan should you get?
The ad-supported Hulu + Live TV plan should suffice if your main objective is to watch live sports or local news. You have to watch the ads that appear on the live stream anyway, so paying extra won’t make a difference.
The Hulu (No Ads) + Live TV plan is best for people looking to binge through Hulu’s catalog of on-demand programming. Hulu does not have a very diverse mix of ads. Even within the same show, you’re likely to see the same ad more than once. There are only so many times you can watch that ad for psoriasis medication. Paying an extra $6/month to make psoriasis ads go away is a pretty good deal.
Chris Casper • Author
Chris Casper is a former tech industry product manager who escaped from California for New Mexico. Now he writes about science and tech while searching for the perfect green chile sauce.
Kelsey Reynolds • Editor
Kelsey is a content strategist based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. She holds a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing from the University of Minnesota. Kelsey was drawn to working at Flixed because the team was so open, motivated, and curious. She most enjoys thinking about how to blend programmatic and editorial content to answer readers’ questions as completely and efficiently as possible. When she’s not at her computer, Kelsey can usually be found working in her garden or walking her two dogs in the park.