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BBC iPlayer has finally arrived on Sky’s catch up service, granting Sky+ customers the chance to watch the best of the Beeb’s programming on demand, without having to plug in a laptop or switch to another set-top box.
From today you can access Auntie’s broadcasts by pressing the TV Guide button on your remote, then the red button to access On Demand. Slide across to the Catch Up tab and you’ll see the iPlayer app, alongside similar apps for Channel 5 and ITV, which launched earlier this year.
You’ll need to be set-up for On Demand for all this to work, with your Sky box plugged into your broadband router. If you don’t have access to Sky’s on-demand library yet, you can get it by visiting this page and clicking the ‘add to basket’ button.
There’s HD video available, but to get to it you’ll need to navigate to a specific ‘BBC HD’ section in the app’s ‘Channels’ section.
It’s hard to know how much high-definition video we’ll actually see nestling in this app in the future, I suspect we’ll just have to wait and see, but a healthy amount of HD goodies is going to be essential if Sky wants this partnership to seem like more than a token addition.
The addition of iPlayer brings a much-needed boost to Sky’s on-demand offering, as well as giving Sky the chance to play catch-up themselves — iPlayer is already sitting pretty on rival devices like Virgin’s TiVo box or the Xbox 360.
Where’s 4oD?
The only major UK channel now absent from Sky’s line-up is Channel 4. Sky has confirmed that 4oD will be joining iPlayer and ITV Player, but when I asked this morning, there was no advance on an ‘early next year’ launch date. For now, Sky customers will just have to sit tight.
Do you have Sky+? If so, let me know what you think of the catch-up service — and whether you think there’s enough HD programming — in the comments below or on our Facebook wall.
