If you want to watch sports live but don’t have cable service, streaming is the next best option, but unfortunately interruptions come your way. Here’s how to get around them.
The MLB regular season is in full swing, and that means making time to watch all the games. Unfortunately, not paying for an expensive cable package means you won’t be able to watch most of the games you want to watch because local channels, most of which are primetime, and your favorite team or may not be playing.
However, a MLB.TV Subscription, you can watch any game you want, but blackout restrictions still apply. But with a little effort, you can circumvent these blackout restrictions and watch your favorite team’s game whenever and wherever you want.
For this how-to, we’ll show you how to bypass most blackout restrictions from sports streaming apps so you can really make good use of your MLB.TV subscription and watch your home team play.
How does it work?
To get around blackout restrictions, you have to trick the streaming service into thinking you’re somewhere you really aren’t. For example, I wouldn’t normally be able to watch my Chicago White Sox game because it’s in the adjacent power outage area of Indiana. However, by using something called a Virtual Private Network (VPN), I can trick MLB.TV into saying I’m in Canada, which is outside the blackout zone.
The nice thing about this particular example is that MLB.TV initially didn’t have any blackout restrictions in Canada, so if the White Sox were playing the Toronto Blue Jays one day, they still wouldn’t have any blackout restrictions, so it’s changing my “location” in Canada ideal in this case.
If it sounds confusing to setup, it really isn’t that bad and I’ll guide you step-by-step through the process. Lets start!
Sign Up for a VPN Service
There are loads of VPN services to choose from, but we personally love it. Unblock-Us, because it is relatively inexpensive and often fairly easy to install. It costs just over $50 per year, which is just over $4 per month. However, if you want to try before paying, you can sign up for a free one-week no-hassle trial.
When you’re registered and ready, you’ll want to configure Unblock-Us to run on your computer. Fortunately, they have a bunch of guides to help you get set up, but we’ll give you a text-based version if it’s more helpful. Here’s how to install Unblock-Us.
First off, Unblock-Us works a little differently than other VPN services. While other VPN services (like my previous favorite My Private Internet Access) are using an app you launch and enable, they basically change the DNS servers your computer uses to access the internet.
I noticed that sports streaming apps do not work properly with such VPN services, so Unblock-Us was the next best option.
For Mac users, you’ll want to enter and click on the top tab. You should see your DNS servers listed (you will only have one or two). Click on your existing DNS servers and hit the minus icon at the bottom to delete them, but be sure to write them down so you know what they are if you need to go back.
Next, you will add two new DNS servers to the list, so click the plus icon and add these two DNS servers:
Click and then you’ll be ready to go! Go to Unblock-Us.com to verify your connection and make sure it’s established. If it says it’s not set up properly, you may need to restart your computer and router.
In Windows 8, actually download an app this will take care of all the messy work for you.
Unblock-Us works on game consoles, mobile devices and even other devices like Apple TV. one can see full list of supported devices on the service’s website and accompanying installation guides.
