Hulu Is Still The Place To Catch Up On Network TV (Even If It’s No Longer Free)

The Big Four networks — ABC, NBC, FOX and CBS — are airing more than 50 season and series premieres this week, including a borderline ridiculous 10 that ran last night and another eight tonight.

How’s your fall premiere week going so far? About like this?

Fortunately, the networks are providing a number of ways to catch up on the avalanche of shows:

• Satellite and cable. You can catch up on ABC, NBC, FOX and CBS shows with the DVR and on-demand functions on your set-top box, and on service provider apps like Xfinity and TWC TV, on the networks’ websites, and (except for CBS) on the networks’ apps.
• CBS All Access. CBS’s All Access app is oriented toward subscribers ($9.99 a month ad-free, $5.99 ad-supported) and doesn’t provide authenticated access for cable and satellite provider. CBS All Access provides episodes without a login eight days after broadcast.
• Hulu. ABC, NBC and FOX are streaming nearly all of their new and returning shows on Hulu ($11.99 a month ad-free, $7.99 ad-supported) the day after broadcast. A few weeks ago, Hulu ended its free tier, which had provided free, ad-supported episodes for some shows a week after broadcast.
• Yahoo View. Picking up where the free, ad-supported tier of Hulu left off, Yahoo View will have free, ad-supported episodes of some ABC, NBC and FOX shows a week after broadcast and for a limited period. The specifics will become clearer when those shows start rolling out next week. There are no Yahoo View apps yet, but the old Yahoo app is still alive and kicking. (And still hast the last season of Community!)

For cord-cutters, the most premium experience for fall TV is Hulu. I’m partial to the ad-free tier because I loathe, loathe, loathe watching TV ads and it’s only $4 more than the ad-supported tier. The ad loads aren’t actually all that bad on the ad-supported tier, though they’re annoyingly repetitious. As with CBS All Access, if the service is worth it to you, it’s worth another $4 a month to eliminate the ads.

Hulu has a large and — as best I can tell — complete lineup of ABC, NBC and FOX fall shows. The fall premieres from those three networks have become available on Hulu the following morning, including the much anticipated Designated Survivor starring Kiefer Sutherland that premiered last night on ABC and arrived this morning on Hulu.

Most of the in-season shows are from ABC, NBC and FOX, but there are a handful from other networks like USA’s WWE Monday Night Raw and WWE Smackdown, Bloomberg’s With All Due Respect, PBS’s Charlie Rose, and several Spanish-language telenovelas.

Hulu also has its own growing list of originals like The Mindy Project (coming back October 4) and Hugh Laurie starrer Chance (premiering October 19). Hulu also has a number of off-network exclusives like AMC’s Fear the Walking Dead, Lifetime’s UnReal and WGN America’s Underground and a fairly impressive list of international series like Deutschland 83 and The Wine Show.

Hulu has a great new feature this fall — notifications that show you when new episodes are available and how many unwatched episodes you have. The feature is smart enough to distinguish new shows from catalog shows, so a recent show will have the “New Episode” bar plus the number of unwatched episodes while a catalog show like TLC’s Toddlers & Tiaras (don’t judge) will just have the number of unwatched episodes.

The green bar and the numbers only show up on shows in your Watchlist, so your interface won’t be clogged with them when you browse for other shows. The feature mirrors across Hulu’s various platforms, including on the four that I use the most (web, Roku, iPad and iPhone). For design and ease of use, Watchlist beats similar features on Netflix, Amazon, Sling TV and Playstation Vue.

There’s a lot to watch right now, but you can do it. Just pace yourselves and make sure you get a little sunshine every couple of days.

Fall TV is a marathon, not a sprint.

Scott Porch writes about the streaming-media industry for Decider and is also a contributing writer for Playboy and Signature. You can follow him on Twitter @ScottPorch.