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Sundance Now Review
Like the acclaimed film festival with the same name, Sundance Now is home to documentaries, films, and series that are known for their high-quality and thought-provoking content. It has a stellar catalog of curated international content, and the service is now creating its own Sundance movies, documentaries, and shows.
The Sundance Now app is also great for families and friends since it allows unlimited simultaneous viewing. Just don’t plan on watching its content in 4K — it only streams in standard and high definition. But for $7 per month or $60 annually, Sundance Now provides affordable and award-winning content without advertisements.
Sundance Now at a Glance
How We Evaluated Sundance Now
With the increase in available video on-demand streaming options, cord-cutters are becoming more selective with the services they choose. Many streaming services under the shadows of behemoths like Netflix and Hulu have found niche markets where they’re able to clearly differentiate themselves from the competition with curated catalogs and original content.
Sundance Now has made a name for itself by offering independent movies, films, series, and documentaries as well as a host of experience-enhancing technical features and a compelling interface. We assessed the service based on its catalog of documentaries, films, and series, as well as its streaming capabilities and compared the service to competitors, including Criterion Channel and Netflix.
Sundance Now vs. Other Video Streaming Services
Key Sundance Now Features
Simultaneous Viewing
The service’s simultaneous viewing capability gives the Sundance Now app a serious competitive advantage. While services like Netflix and Hulu limit simultaneous streams to anywhere from 2 to 5 screens depending on the package, Sundance Now doesn’t seem to have a cap. This feature alone makes Sundance Now a tantalizing option for large families and movie-loving groups of friends. You can stream the Sundance app simultaneously across four devices without any image quality issues. Just don’t expect to see anything regarding simultaneous viewing stipulated on its website.
Multiple ways to watch
Sundance Now works with a decent array of devices and streaming platforms. You can watch with Amazon Prime Video and FireTV, Android and iOS devices, Apple TV, desktops, laptops, Roku, smart TVs, and Xbox One. If your device falls outside of the listed devices, there’s a workaround you can use. By subscribing to and viewing Sundance Now through Amazon’s app, you can watch all of Sundance’s extensive library without limitations. This is useful if you would prefer to stream Sundance Now through PlayStation 4, for example. Sundance Now isn’t available on that device, but the Amazon app is.
Unique catalog of content
Sundance Now releases fresh documentaries, films, and series every week. Industry “tastemakers” select popular and award-winning films from around the world to highlight. The service has a special relationship with the Sundance Film Festival — it invites award-winning filmmakers to create and submit lists of their favorite flicks. And there’s no need to worry about pesky advertisements interrupting your experience. Popular series include “The Split,” which follows a successful divorce lawyer struggling with her personal life, “McMafia,” a show inspired by the book chronicling a Russian mob boss living in London, and “The Preppy Murder,” a docuseries that examines a crime committed in 1980s New York City.
The Bottom Line
Sundance Now provides a growing list of carefully chosen and curated content from around the world, while also offering originally produced documentaries, films, and series. If you’re a cinephile or someone who really appreciates top-notch filmmaking, Sundance Now will appeal to you. However, Sundance Now doesn’t cater to the same type of general audience as Netflix and Hulu, so if you’re not into independent films, another streaming service might serve you better.
About the Authors
Zack Kulm is a writer and contributor to soda.com. He covers a variety of topics from entertainment and gaming technologies to pop culture commentary. Kulm received a degree in English from Penn State University and Film Studies from Pittsburgh Filmmakers Institute. He also produces award-winning documentaries.
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