Watch live TV, the latest news, indie films, award-winning documentaries, full-length TV shows, science series, history shows, and iconic classics from PBS and member stations, all from the PBS Video app. Stream your favorite PBS shows anytime, anywhere with new PBS content added daily!
Stream TV shows, indie films, dramas, mysteries & documentaries easily. TV shows are yours to discover, live or on demand on one streaming & entertainment app. Get the latest news with local live TV streaming. Start live streaming news, and watch your favorite documentaries, dramas & musicals anywhere on one entertainment app.
Watch series and discover new episodes from shows like Masterpiece, Ken Burns, NOVA, Nature, PBS NewsHour, Frontline, Antiques Roadshow, Finding Your Roots, American Experience, American Masters, Independent Lens, POV, Great Performances, Call the Midwife & much more.
Watch TV anywhere. Indie movies, documentaries, local TV, live news, history shows, & dramas are just a few taps away on your mobile device, tablet, computer or smart TV. Add popular documentaries, TV shows, timeless classics, dramas, history shows, musicals & more to your watchlist and easily stream them at any time on the PBS Video App.
PBS VIDEO FEATURES:
WATCH LIVE NEWS & LOCAL TV
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– Explore an expanded library of acclaimed PBS programming and local station shows
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– On demand TV shows, indie movies, & more are at your fingertips
– Watch award-winning series & documentaries from anywhere
– Browse TV shows by genre, curated lists & Passport favorites
– Save episodes of your favorite TV shows to a custom watchlist
WATCH A VARIETY OF CONTENT
– Watch TV shows, series & videos from the PBS archives
– Watch movies anywhere from the documentary and indie film genre
– Stream curated playlists of short films, interviews & extras
– Watch local TV or catch up on your favorite TV series
– Binge watch TV shows of all genres on the PBS Video app
DISCOVER PBS VIDEO
– Endless entertainment and live news is right in the palm of your hand with PBS Video
– Watch TV anywhere & explore our vast selection of shows on one entertainment app
– On demand shows from drama, documentary, history, arts, nature & science await your discovery
– Live streaming news and catching up on public affairs is made easy with the PBS Video app
– Stream TV shows from a broad range of genres like Downton Abbey, NOVA, Finding Your Roots, Professor T & so much more!
WHAT’S NEW ON PBS
– Ridley Road on MASTERPIECE
– Benjamin Franklin: A Film by Ken Burns
– Our Changing Planet
– Now Hear This on Great Performances
– Luna and Sophie on Walter’s Choice
WATCH MORE WITH PBS PASSPORT
Passport is an added benefit of station membership. By donating to your local PBS station you can:
– Stream an expanded library of acclaimed PBS programming
– Extended access to 1,500+ episodes of your favorite shows
– Watch past and current seasons of popular shows like Downton Abbey & All Creatures Great and Small
– Binge watch new TV series and your favorite PBS programs, like Finding Your Roots
– Stream early releases and special collections, like Ken Burns films
Watch TV anywhere and stream PBS Video today.
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LEARN MORE
– PBS Video: https://www.pbs.org/videoapp
– PBS Passport: https://pbs.org/getpassport
– PBS Support: https://help.pbs.org/
PBS offers all Americans the opportunity to explore new worlds through trusted educational television and digital content.
For the past two or three years I have struggled with this app. It just stops streaming when it gets overloaded or something. It’s disappointing! I came on here to write I would be canceling my subscription to PBS as they don’t seem to put any money into their equipment. However,I just noticed there is a new video player and controls so I have just reinstalled the app and will try again. PBS, please don’t disappoint me. I will cancel my subscription if it doesn’t make things better.
I am a recent PBS Passport member. It’s great. More NOVA and Nature but a few things could be better. The desktop video player has speed controls and this app does not. I would love to be able to speed up the videos in the app. Also, I would love for a skip ahead 10 seconds button on the app as well. Again the desktop version does this, but would appreciate it on the mobile app. Thanks for the great content!
I live off grid and use the PBS app instead of TV. I appreciate being able to watch PBS News hour on demand, even if it is a day later. I also enjoy the dramas. I often use the more educational shows to help me sleep. The narrator of the Ken Burns films is especially good for this. Don’t be offended. I often do watch them again when I am alert. I like that I am learning about history, the environment, and even some science. I would find it hard to do without the PBS app.
Content: Awesome. App: Horrible. I’m a Passport subscriber and have donated to PBS for decades — because I believe in the quality television they deliver. The Nature episode “My Garden of a Thousand Bees” is truly amazing. Wish I could praise the app, too. When I watch TV via Chromecast with Google TV (CCwGTV), the app is incredibly frustrating. On the left, there is navigation column: Home, Shows, Search, My List, My Station, Profile. The cursor will not go beyond “Shows” — so I can’t search, look at My List, etc. And, yes, I have successfully linked the app to my Passport Account. PBS, please, please fix your app! I have a big beautiful TV, but because your App is so bad, I wind up watching your wonderful shows on my little computer screen. Not a happy Passport subscriber…
Excellent library of content. Netflix has really declined, so I cancelled it, and donated to PBS to become a member and gain access to Passport. I’ve enjoyed it a lot so far, except the video playback. The play/pause function is inconsistent and causes the time marker to jump around randomly, and there’s no double-tap to fast forward or rewind a few seconds like most other video streaming apps have. So, great service and fairly good app, but the app could use some improvement.
Very long load times. The Circle of Death just keeps spinning. I used to love PBS and its content back when I could get it through a normal TV signal. I was so excited to find the app. Using the app is frustrating and disappointing though. If and when I finally get a video to start more than 90% of the time is spent buffering. I play video from Amazon Prime and Netflix from any of my devices without buffering or slow loading. I cannot get this app to work on any of my devices. Why be this way?
While I do like accessing PBS shows from my phone, I have two main issues with this app. First of all, you can find shows and get excited to watch them, but there aren’t any episodes you can actually watch. What’s the point in adding that to my list? And the most annoying thing is when I start watching a show and then need to stop and come back to it, the app won’t remember my place. That technology exists! I use it on other platforms every day! Even YouTube remembers where I stopped watching a video. But PBS won’t bring it to the top like a recently viewed, and it definitely won’t remember my place in a video so I have to search for my video AND find where I left off every time I restart the app (either on my phone or on the TV). Such a hassle.
I was told by PBS Help Desk this will not work on Google TV with Chromecast, however it appears to work fine for me. Although it doesn’t show on the apps bar by default like Netflix etc, it is located in “More Apps” and I am able to play, pause, rewind, fast forward, etc. with no problems so far. The controls could be more responsive, and it’s an extra step to access the app, thus the 4 stars.
Since the Oct 1 2020 update to include a live stream, the app hasn’t been working properly. It loads every video with closed captioning on, it doesn’t always let you turn it off, and even once you do manage to turn it off it reappears anytime you switch apps, like if you’re casting. It also won’t remove some shows from my list, and if you cast a video and don’t go back into the app before it finishes, you need to force close the app before restarting it. Hoping these issues will be fixed soon.
Love the content, hate the app So many frustrating aspects to this app. I have to sign in every single day for it to recognize I’m a passport subscriber. The sign in screen doesn’t give the option of showing the password so if I mistype I have to start over again from scratch. More than half the time when I pause a video it goes back to the beginning of the episode due to poor interface design. No options for going back a short way if you missed what someone said. All in all frustrating to use!
I enjoy watching all the great content on the app, but there are definitely improvements to be made- namely a “resume watching” option on the main page. Similarly, I wish that episodes of a series would auto play after completing the previous one. It is really annoying to go into my saved shows, select the season I am watching, and then pick the episode every time.
The only saving grace is the content. The video playback functions and operation are very antiquated. The scrubbing is terrible and incredibly frustrating. If you want to pull the video back a few seconds, you have to go back more than a minute. There is no fine scrubbing, nor are there “go back/forward 10 seconds” buttons, like every other streaming app in existence. With all of the years that we have had video apps, this one is like stepping back to the mid 90s in functionality.
Phenomenal content and surprisingly with older documentaries; it’s fascinating to see the US milieu from years passed. However, it can be tedious to peruse the catalogue. Sometimes it kicks you back to the home screen when you just wanna go back to one section. And the back button, at times, makes you switch to the last app used on your phone. But this is still a 100i% recommend.
On my Android devices, the app is fine. On my Android TV, it’s another story. I can’t get through 10 minutes of 1 episode of History Detectives that it doesn’t reset to the beginning. I have to back out of the app, even shut off my TV, to get the chance to ffwd back to where I was (“resume” takes me back to the beginning, too). This is nervewracking. I lose content because I have to fwd past the reset point several times an episode. Doesn’t happen with any other streaming service or show. UGH!
I have the app on my phone and iPad. On my iPad there are playback options like rewind 10secs but on my Android no, which makes it hard and a bit annoying to watch as I want h many things on my phone. I’d rather just watch it on my TV which limits when I can watch it such as if you are on the go or in the car. Other than that I love the shows and documentaries!!! Very educational.
I love PBS and want to support them every way I can, became a PassPort member to get access to the catalog of shows. When this app works, it’s wonderful and high quality. Unfortunately, most of the time it doesn’t…will stop, buffer, won’t start up again. Have to go to the beginning and restart, trying to drop in where I got cut off. Watching one 55 minute drama episode actually takes 1:30 if I’m lucky, 2 hrs if not. I also have Hulu, Starz, Netflix…but absolutely no issues with them.
A Work in Progress: Has some nice features and obviously great content, but functionally frustrating. I really don’t mind the ads (never thought I would say that!) but finding content is difficult (search for the most recent NewsHour Weekend) and the results are completely random and you won’t find the one you are looking for. Really just easier searching UTube forget the app. And sometimes it starts at the beginning of a show begun previously… but not always! Hopefully it’s a beta version.
I love PBS, I do not love this app. All my other streaming apps work perfectly, you click on a show and then you watch the show, real easy. I’ve got insanely fast internet but some how this app has non stop buffering and out of sync audio – video. It doesn’t even start in sync and then slowly get out of sync. No this app somehow manages to be drastically out of sync as soon as you hit play. It’s like I’m time traveling back to the days of dial up every time I want to watch my favorite PBS shows.
I LOVE LOVE PBS with my whole heart, but this app is buggy. When you navigate through episodes of a series on the Firestick, when you hit the 10th episode in the list, it flips screens, so there are episodes to which you cannot navigate. Attenborough and the Sea Dragon on nature is my favorite example of this. I’ve cleared my cache, too, which did fix an earlier bug I mentioned in my earlier review. Any ideas here?
Content is great, but I have to rate the app honestly. Too many issues to count but for example, looking at a list of episodes (which are in no logical order) and scrolling down it suddenly resets and you can now only see some of the episodes in that season. The closed captioning turns on randomly. After watching an episode it doesn’t play the next automatically, which is alright but I don’t know how to find the next episode without searching for the entire show again. Hope they improve it soon
So nice to watch Masterpiece Theater and mysteries. I really wish the progress bar at the bottom of the screen worked so I could gauge the time better. It seems to work for a few minutes then – stays stuck on a number of minutes. The last episode I watched – was 14:45 for the entire show. It would be nice if when an episode is watched to completion – the next sequential episode would be next in when the app was opened again. And it would be nice if Passport would open on TV browser.
The Android app needs a way to skip forward and back! This is the only streaming video app of several I have used, including Netflix, Prime Video, Tubi, CBS and others that has no means of moving back or forward by 10, 15 or 30 seconds. This is totally unacceptable as it makes it impossible to back up to take another look at a missed detail or part of the video missed due to life’s inevitable distractions. As a sustaining member of my local PBS station I find this omission very disappointing.
I guess I’m too used to all the perks of the Netflix and Amazon apps. This app is extremely limited in its functionality, unfortunately. You can’t back up or fast forward at all when watching a show. The ability to put shows in a list of favorites fails in its functionality. When I click the check mark to add a show, it is not added. Just now I was watching a video in this app and an error message came up telling me that I needed the PBS video app. IOW, the very app I was inside rejected itself.
Very helpful way to stream hundreds of quality programs. App seems very stable (been using 6 months). Plays well with Chromecast. Two areas for improvement: 1. Add Back and Forward skip buttons in player 2. Fix the browsing defect (looking for stuff to watch) so that when you go back from a specific title, you are not launched to some semi-random screen, thus losing your place.
App has improved, as has content available to Passport members. However, it’s still a frustrating experience, notably: the locked promos than run 25 secs every time you do more than pause; the inability to do a simple 10 sec rev /ffwd (and having to manually move the marker only to encounter a huge leap back and a promo again), and having to hunt for the next episode, rather than a simple prompt to continue. Casting has been dimly lit w Samsung Smart View. [-> Only setting is My Station – ??]
Clumsy, not well maintained. Once a video expires (free episodes expire) it is stuck in your “my list” with no way to remove. Videos are unavailable on expiration date, not the day after. Routinely get “video unavailable right now” messages. Buffering issues. Even with paid passport, not much of their extensive library is available. FF and Rewind in their player (Firestick) is rudimentary. The app and their offerings could be so much better. For me, it’s currently not worth the passport costs.
The App repeatedly closes on my Android phone. Sometimes it doesn’t even open. If it opens, it cuts off as soon as I attempt to watch anything. It is entirely useless. A “solution” is not to delete & reinstall as I wd lose all my lists & places where I have only partially listened to an episode. Also, I watched the 1st episode of “McLeod’s Daughters” the other night. Woo hoo! The program had notifications that I cd binge watch future episodes on passport. No I cdn’t as it is not listed.
I have installed this several times and have so wanted to like it. But it keeps crashing when streaming to Chromecast on multiple devices. Bad enough that it will sporadically stop more than once during a program but then it starts over and returns me to the beginning. I can uninstall PBS Video and stream the same programs just fine from PBS website. And I can stream other app’s content without problems, too. So, it’s the app IMO.
Tried to watch the VP Debate via Chromecast using this app. Not a good experience. Took a long-time to connect, and the video kept freezing. Every time I tried to reconnect, I had to watch the same very intrusive 30-second ad. Who would have expected ads to be just as intrusive on PBS as on the major commercial networks? Imo, app should keep track of what users try to watch every time the app is opened and not subject them to the same ad more than once per show.
SAFETY CRITICAL: Episodes are preceded by a 30 second full-screen-locked ad with no in-app method of halting or resizing the video. In emergency situations, it is critical that the simplest conforming method be available to halt the video. 1)If PBS wants 30s ads locked at full screen, make sure some type of halt option is displayed when the user taps the screen. 2)If PBS cannot do that, the video needs to resize when the phone is oriented vertically, then the user can access other functions.
I like donating to my local station and it’s nice to have the passport benefit. I must rate this app so low because of the “video not available for playback” error. I understand distribution rights is complicated under pbs with all the different stations. It’s frustrating clicking on a show and getting that error. At this point I would rather have an app from my local station that could show me what i could watch instead of all these errors from this app.
I love PBS, but this app is really buggy. Doesn’t keep track of what you’ve already watched in a series and the closed captioning keeps randomly coming on. I could deal with these small annoyances if it didn’t constantly glitch, moving backwards or forwards a few seconds over and over. I have uninstalled/reinstalled more than once and restarted chromecast as well. The glitching makes it miserable to try to watch anything, very disappointing.
Really unfortunate that I have to rate the app so poorly. I’ve uninstalled and re-download three times, and it still refuses to work when I try to cast it to my TV. The app also closely frequently. *Everytime it opens it says unexpected error as well. *Edited to add that I have a Note 10. I hope the issue is fixed soon, because I do enjoy PBS.
This is by far one of the best apps you can get for any smart phone. The full library of PBS programming for amazing shows like Frontline. I’ve been watching PBS for years, and since I’ve cut the cord having the ability use this app for FREE to access new and old content is incredible. Thank you to the devs and PBS team for all your hard work on this. It works incredibly well paired with a Chromecast.
Coming from the Roku app this version for Android TV is garbage. Biggest gripe is there is no way to view content that isn’t in their featured categories. Want to browse by drama or nature and science? Good luck with that. The only way around I’ve seen is to login on the website to browse what I want to watch then add it to my list to be available on Android TV. This isn’t a new problem but I’d hoped they’d figure it out. I regret renewing my passport access…
Video player cannot fast forward or rewind and does not sync properly with Roku app. Please add functionality to skip ahead and rewind in 15 s increments or something like that (like what is possible in YouTube). Also when I watch something on TV via my Roku player, the pbs app on my phone doesn’t sync the position properly. (Oddly the sync works in the other direction, ie, when I watch on my phone, the Roku app syncs the position properly.)
This is a wonderful app!! I’m VERY HAPPY with it in every way ☺ !! There is only one brief commercial at the beginning of each episode/show before the opening credits, then the rest of the program is totally commercial-free. And if you need to move back/forward It’s so easy with the time-line feature. I literally can’t find ANYTHING wrong with this app. It’s wonderful. Don’t pay attention to the complainers… this is a free app. You don’t need to be a member to use it either.
terrible interface, no way to change video quality settings to improve performance, Victoria kept buffering, then starting from the beginning, and ads pop up in the middle of the show! Maddening to want to see great shows, especially since I a member. An inferior experience, and I went back to Netflix.
Good, but implementation of captions could be better. For example, in settings on Netflix and Hulu, you can set the service to display captioning always. PBS’ app does not have this feature in settings. So, i have to let show come on, quickly pause show, then click on show’s CC button, then rewind, and now watch with CCaptions. It gets tiresome. if PBS will add global captioning in the Settings, that will be better than having to turn it on per viewing. Thanks.
Painfully slow, when it actually works. I realize it maaaayy be my phone (LG Stylo6, running Android 10), BUT all of the other 5 tv/movie streaming apps run without much (or any) issues. Search function could use a few more filtering options. For example: Free (no PBS “Passport required), full episodes/clips, subject, style (doc Educational, scripted, etc.), For starters. If I only plays the selection 25% guess it doesn’t really matter. I just subscribed to PBS on Prime Video instead of this app