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Here’s all the ways you can watch March Madness

You'll need subscriptions to two different streaming services if you want to catch every game.

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NCAA

Another year, another March without any federal holidays. Thankfully, that void is filled by the NCAA tournament otherwise known as March Madness. Filling our brackets is an annual tradition for many, even if they don’t follow college basketball closely, and the tournament’s ultimately outcome is often incredibly surprising.

If you’re looking for ways to watch the tournament yourself, though, we’ve got you covered. Here’s everything you need to know about how to watch March Madness:

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Paramount+

CBS and Turner Sports own the broadcast rights to all the men’s games. Naturally, that means you can watch all of the men’s games that air on CBS on Paramount+ as well. That will include plenty of games in the rounds of 64 and 32, as well as the Sweet 16 and the Elite Eight. CBS is also the home for the Final Four and the championship game, which means that you’ll only be able to stream those games on Paramount+.

These games should be accessible whether you’re watching Paramount+ on your phone, tablet, or TV, and all games are available no matter what your Paramount+ subscription level is.

Max

Many of the games that aren’t available on Paramount+ and CBS are being broadcast through Turner Sports, which means that they’re instead available on TNT, TBS, or TruTV, and are also available to stream through Max. Max subscribers should have access to the games through the Bleacher Sports package that is a part of their subscription.

A total of 43 games will be available that way, including several play-in games involving lower seeds as well as games in the first and second rounds of the tournament, as well as select games in the Sweet 16 and Elite Eight. The Elite Eight is scheduled to conclude on March 30, which is also the day that Max is set to end access to Bleacher Sports at all subscription levels. Moving forward, you’ll need to be subscribed to an ad-free tier to access live sports, but that shouldn’t be an issue for this year’s tournament.

YouTube TV, FuboTV, or Hulu + Live TV

If you don’t want to fuss with streaming subscriptions but you also don’t have a cable package, the easiest way to get all of the March Madness games is likely to subscribe to YouTube TV, FuboTV, or Hulu + Live TV. All of these options essentially replicate a cable package, allowing you to customize different subscriptions and get access to different channels. All three should get you access to both CBS and the Turner Sports network, meaning that you’ll be able to watch every game that you want.

YouTube TV also has a Paramount+ add-on, although you can also simply watch the games through CBS, so there might not be much point to it.

Joe Allen
Joe Allen
Former Writer
Joe Allen is a freelance writer at Digital Trends, where he covers Movies and TV. He frequently writes streaming… Read Full Bio
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