Cutting cable in the United States or Canada means choosing between four things that get described the same way and behave nothing alike. YouTube TV, Sling and Fubo are licensed streaming packages. IPTV is a different delivery model entirely. Lumping them together is why so many people end up paying for the wrong one.
This compares them on the only basis that matters: what you actually watch, and what each one charges you to reach it.
Prices below were checked in August 2026 and are for the base US plans. Streaming services change pricing frequently, so treat them as the shape of the market rather than a quote.
YouTube TV: The Default Everyone Compares Against
Around $72.99 a month. It is the default recommendation for a reason — the interface is excellent, the unlimited DVR genuinely is unlimited, and it works everywhere without thought.
What people underestimate is the trajectory. It launched around $35 and has roughly doubled. You are also paying for a full national bundle whether you watch it or not, which is the exact economics people left cable to escape. If you watch a dozen channels, you are funding roughly ninety you never open.
Sling TV: Cheaper, With a Deliberate Catch
Sling Orange runs about $45.99, Orange and Blue together about $60.99. The saving is real, and so is the reason for it.
Sling splits channels across two packages that deliberately do not overlap. ESPN sits in one, FS1 and NFL Network in the other. Follow more than one sport and you often discover the cheap plan was never the one you needed — the two-package price lands close to the competition you were avoiding. Sling is genuinely good value if your viewing fits inside one package. Check that before you subscribe, not after.
Fubo: Built for Sports, Priced For It
Roughly $84.99 to $109.99 depending on plan, with a cheaper sports-focused tier around $64.99. Fubo is the most sports-complete of the three and it does not pretend otherwise.
It is also the most expensive way to watch television in this comparison, and its entertainment lineup is thinner than the price suggests. Fubo makes sense for one specific person: the household where sport is the reason the TV is on, and where the alternative is buying two other services to cover the same ground.
Where IPTV Fits — And Where It Does Not
IPTV is not a fourth brand in that list. It is a different delivery model: television sent over your internet connection as a stream you access with credentials, rather than through a licensed national app.
The practical differences that matter:
- Breadth is far wider. International channels, foreign-language networks and competitions the US packages never carry.
- No regional blackouts. The blackout rules that frustrate US sports fans are a licensing artifact, not a technical one.
- Cost is a fraction. A BexyTV subscription works out under ten dollars a month on an annual term against the seventy-plus above.
- No native DVR. There is 7-day catch-up on live channels, which covers most of what a DVR is used for, but it is not the same thing.
- Your connection matters more. There is no local buffer of pre-positioned content to fall back on.
Being straight about the trade: the licensed services offer contractual certainty and a support number. IPTV offers breadth and price. Which of those you value is a genuine judgement, not a trick question.
The Number Nobody Publishes: Cost Per Channel You Actually Watch
Headline prices compare packages. They do not compare you. So do this instead, and it takes ten minutes.
Write down every channel you genuinely watched in the last month. Not could watch — did. (That list is also the basis for organizing a channel list later.) For most households the list is between six and fourteen, and it is remarkably stable.
Now divide each service’s monthly price by that number. A household watching nine channels on YouTube TV is paying about eight dollars per channel per month. The same nine channels on a service costing under ten dollars a month costs about one. That ratio, not the headline price, is what actually determines whether switching is worth the disruption.
It also tells you when not to switch: if your nine channels are all US networks with excellent apps and you value the DVR, the licensed package is doing its job.
Which One Suits Which Household
| If you are | Choose |
|---|---|
| Mainstream US viewing, want a DVR, price is secondary | YouTube TV |
| Light viewer whose channels fit one package | Sling |
| Sport is the whole reason the TV is on | Fubo |
| Want international or foreign-language channels | IPTV |
| Paying for two or three services to follow one sport | IPTV |
| Cost per channel watched is your deciding factor | IPTV |
Check These Four Things Before Switching Anything
- Your actual channel list, by name. Every option above looks fine until the one network you care about is missing.
- Your evening internet, not your afternoon speed test. All four are streaming services and none of them survive a line that collapses at 8pm.
- How many people watch at once. Simultaneous streams are limited on every service here, and it is the constraint households discover last.
- Whether you genuinely use a DVR. If yes, that is a real argument for the licensed services. If you have not opened your recordings in a month, it is not.
The Honest Recommendation
If your viewing is mainstream American television and the monthly cost does not bother you, YouTube TV is a good product and you should keep it. Nothing here is an argument against that.
If you are paying seventy dollars or more and watching a handful of channels, or you want international coverage the US packages simply do not carry, the arithmetic stops favouring them quickly. That is the case BexyTV is built for — 26,000+ channels including the international and sports coverage the licensed bundles leave out, at a fraction of the monthly cost.
Do not take that on trust. Run the cost-per-channel exercise on your own list, then test BexyTV free during a busy evening before paying anything. If it does not hold up under load, you will know within an hour.
