NFL+ opens new connected TV play for league in streaming wars

The NFL today launched the next iteration of its direct-to-consumer app with some very specific rights around streaming games—and of course it’s called NFL+.

On Monday, the league made NFL+ the official successor app to NFL Game Pass, sunsetting that subscription product domestically. NFL+ has a two-tiered subscription model, basic ($4.99 a month) and premium ($9.99 a month), and no ad component to start.

NFL+ will stream in-market games—games that are already available through TV broadcasts in local markets—and primetime games to mobile devices and tablets. The premium version of NFL+ will have replays of all games on mobile devices, tablets and through a connected TV app. “There is a CTV component,” said Gil Moran, NFL’s VP of strategy and business management, in a recent phone interview. “NFL+ will be available on CTV. A lot of the viewing on TV is going to be the game replays.” The NFL also has hundreds of hours of video-on-demand programs.

With NFL+, the league continues to develop its own streaming services, even if it is still fairly limited. But it opens the potential to bring more league content directly to viewers. For instance, the NFL will stream all preseason games live on the app, in-market and out-of-market, on mobile, tablet and connected TVs. In the case of "Thursday Night Football," though, which Amazon paid big money to host, NFL+ will only stream those games on mobile devices and tablets.

“If you are looking to consume the games on TV through the Amazon ecosystem, that’s where you go,” Moran said. “And that’s where we would encourage people to go. NFL+ is going to have those games, like every other game in the regular season, on mobile and tablet.”

NFL game rights are some of the most highly prized sports and entertainment programming. Over the years the league has become a master of doling out rights to games to run on broadcast TV, through streaming services, and video on demand on platforms like YouTube. Last year, the NFL reached an exclusive deal with Amazon to stream "Thursday Night Football" games for the next 11 years, starting this season, on Prime Video. Also, the NFL is still in negotiations to possibly bring Sunday Ticket, which offers complete access to streaming live games, to a connected TV platform for the first time.

With NFL+, the league wanted to “create that vehicle that allows us to grow that offering in the future,” Moran said. “So [it’s] something that we’re going to invest in, something that we’re going to look at adding to, and making sure that we’re making one of the more compelling football propositions out there.”

“It is not meant, in any shape or form, to take away from other things that we have out there,” Moran said. “Obviously, you know, the games on TV are the crown jewel and will continue to be so.”

The intricacies of streaming rights are closely watched by the platforms that want to do major deals with the NFL. TV broadcasters still want their piece of the league, too, because football continues to be the biggest live draw. The league has become year-round entertainment, too, with off-season productions like coverage of the draft, when teams pick their next class of incoming players.

NFL+ costs $4.99 a month, or $39.99 a year, for the most basic tier, which streams live local and primetime games on mobile and tablet, and has live audio streams for every game, in-market and out-of-market. Meanwhile, the premium tier costs $9.99 a month, or $79.99 a year, and comes with all the features of NFL+, but includes replays of every game, and ad-free replays of condensed versions of games. In some cases, the full replays of games will include the ad breaks that were part of the original live broadcasts, but it is not part of a sponsorship play from the league, Moran said.

“That’s not to say that we don’t value the sponsorship component,” Moran said, “and certainly down the road there might be [sponsorship and ad opportunities.] Today, there simply aren’t.”