German commercial broadcast group Mediengruppe RTL Deutschland has merged the catch-up services of its six free-to-air TV channels into a single live-TV and video-on-demand platform.
TV Now offers catch-up content from RTL, RTL II, VOX, Super RTL, RTL Nitro and n-tv. The basic version remains advertising-funded and free of charge while premium version TV Now Plus costs €2.99 per month. It offers higher resolution, the TV channels as live-streams, an archive, less advertisements, access via smartphones and tablets (iOS/Android) and the AirPlay function for Apple TV users. Apps for Chromecast and Amazon Fire TV will follow.
Selected programmes are also available on the multiscreen service ahead of their TV screening such as daily soap Gute Zeiten, schlechte Zeiten. Viewers previously had to pay €0.99 per episode.
TV Now Plus which can be tested for 30 days free of charge replaces the fee-based smartphone/tablet apps RTL Now, RTL II Now and VOX Now.
Competing TV broadcast group ProSiebenSat.1 set up central catch-up platform 7TV.de around one year ago. The Munich-based company didn’t go as far as RTL, though: The separate catch-up services of its free-to-air channels remained in place in parallel.
