What is Optus Sport
Optus Sport is an app that brings your favorite sport games to a wide range of devices. Optus have certainly dug a niche with this app – the telco cornered the market when they snatched the rights to the English Premiere League (EPL) from Fox Sports. After that deal, Optus saw fixed broadband and mobile SIM subscriptions increase from 4 percent to 23.8 percent amongst Australians who watch the EPL on television regularly or occasionally.
The numbers are significant but not surprising. After all, who doesn’t love footy? Optus are willing to bet that you do, and so they have renewed their EPL contract, and now are the exclusive broadcasters of that league. That’s right, if you want to watch EPL matches live, you have to subscribe to Optus Sport.
Optus have also added several other leagues to the Optus Sport lineup. Here’s a quick look at what’s available for live streaming:
- English Premier League (EPL)
- UEFA Champions League
- UEFA Nations League
- UEFA Europa League
- European Qualifiers
While having Optus Sport comes in handy for die-hard footy fans, it isn’t a free app (except for some Optus customers). Customers on the more expensive Optus SIM plans might get Optus Sport for free, but other postpaid customers and non-customers have to shell out $14.99 per month for the app while prepaid customers pay $10 per recharge (every 28 days). This means you can’t get free EPL footy anymore.
So what if you’re no longer interested in paying for soccer games? Well, you can cancel Optus Sport and we’ll tell you how in this post. But first…
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Pros and cons of using optus sport
Like everything else in life, Optus Sport isn’t perfect – it has its drawbacks as well as benefits. Let’s take a look at the pros and cons.
Pros
- Wide range of footy leagues. You live stream everything from the EPL to Japan’s J.League and Copa America.
- Some customers on Optus home broadband, mobile broadband, and prepaid SIM Only plans get Optus Sport for free.
- Optus customers live stream games data-free. That means you can stream footy on your phone or other device without spending your plan data.
- Optus is available to everyone. You don’t have to be an Optus customer.
- You can stream Optus Sport live on a wide range of devices. Android and iOS smartphones, PC and Apple computers, Apple TV, Yes TV by Fetch, Amazon Fire TV, Google Chromecast, your smart TV and more.
Con
Optus Sport is not free. While you could watch live EPL games free of charge on Saturday Nights on the Special Broadcasting Service a couple of years ago, that’s no longer the case. Now, Optus is the sole live broadcaster.
How to cancel Optus Sport
While you might enjoy Optus Sport live content, you’re not stuck with the app. You can cancel your Optus Sport subscription at any time you please. However, it is important to note that you will have to finish out your subscription cycle (til the end of the subscription month) whenever you do cancel.
Here are the steps showing you how to cancel Optus Sport:
Open your MyOptus app > go to Service > go to Add-ons > choose Optus Sport > select Remove Optus Sport > select Deactivate this add-on > select Confirm deactivation.
You can also cancel your Optus subscription using your iPhone, Google Play, App Store, and more.
Conclusion
It may not be just you who cancels Optus Sport. All of the telcos that began getting into entertainment ‘content’ are thinking about getting out.
OVO Mobile were on the market for just a few short years before they were bought by Optus – who then stopped producing and disseminating the content for which OVO had become famous.
The NRL will not be broadcast over Telstra’s network from 2023 – and will, instead, be available only through the 9 Network.
For now, Optus seem to be doubling down on the content they produce. It’s profitable for them (at the current licensing costs they pay) and it’s a differentiator against Big T. Quite as to whether it’s been the game changer they set out to achieve is not clear yet, even years after launch. Which is an answer of it’s own sort.