Best free option
DIRECTV
The quickest way to watch FX for nothing is DIRECTV's free trial. Cancel before it ends and you pay nothing.
Start free trial →
You don't need a cable bill to keep watching FX. Here's every way to stream it online, and how to do it for free.
Reviewed and updated September 2026 by our cord-cutting team · 11 options
FX has a reputation for being the edgy channel that airs critically acclaimed shows like Atlanta, Shogun, and Fargo. The Disney-owned channel used to broadcast sports events too, but it has long dropped them to make way for Marvel, Star Wars, and 20th Century films.
You can watch FX on Fubo, Sling TV Blue, DIRECTV, Hulu with Live TV, Sling Select, YouTube TV, or Spectrum TV Stream.
The cheapest option to watch FX is Sling Select for $19.99/month.
The fastest ways to watch FX without cable, at a glance
The quickest way to watch FX for nothing is DIRECTV's free trial. Cancel before it ends and you pay nothing.
Start free trial →Nothing else on this page carries FX for less each month.
Get Sling TV →The longest run at FX without paying, and long enough to cover a weekend of it.
Start free trial →The widest lineup of the services carrying FX, if you are replacing cable rather than chasing one channel.
Get YouTube TV →We routinely follow over a hundred live TV and streaming services in the US, closely monitoring their plans, features, and channel lineups. All of that work is on our cord-cutting hub.
Beyond this, we have been reviewing the best on streaming services since 2013, recommending highly-rated but little-known movies and shows: we find the gems that you haven't yet watched, that you will probably like.
FX is on DIRECTV, and you can watch it free for DIRECTV's 5-day free trial. Cancel before it ends and you pay nothing.
DirecTV Stream is a good option if you expect a lot of people to share one account. It’s also known to provide better picture quality than other live TV streaming services, which is what you want when watching the big-budgeted blockbusters FX airs. But all those channels and features can slow the service down and make it hard to navigate. There are also plenty of cheaper alternatives if you don’t mind skimping on things like 4k channels and unlimited DVR.
The price climbs steeply between tiers, and a regional sports fee gets added on top.
DIRECTV plans
No, not free. Sling TV carries FX but has no free trial, so you pay from day one. At $45.99/mo it's the cheapest way to watch FX on this list.
Sling Blue addresses most cord-cutters’ needs. Apart from entertainment channels like FX, it also carries local and sports channels like FOX, NBC, TNT, and USA. You can also boost your lineup with Sling’s add-ons, which include the Sports Extra for $11/month and the Hollywood Extra for $6/month. They drive up the final price, but the total is still cheaper than most services in this list.
There's no ESPN on the Blue lineup, and local channels only come in a handful of markets.
Sling TV plans
FX is on Fubo, and you can watch it free for Fubo's 7-day free trial. Cancel before it ends and you pay nothing.
If you miss the days when FX aired sports events, then you’ll love Fubo. It has ESPN, USA, and local channels, not to mention specialty sports channels like Willow, BTN, and the Golf Channel. Crucially, it’s missing Turner channels like TNT and TBS, but it’s otherwise a great option if you’re into sports and entertainment, and if its price is within your budget.
It leans heavily on sports, and a regional sports fee of a few dollars up to about $17 by ZIP gets added on top.
Fubo plans
FX is on Hulu + Live TV, and you can watch it free for Hulu + Live TV's 3-day free trial. Cancel before it ends and you pay nothing.
Hulu with Live TV’s biggest advantage is that it already comes with Hulu, which is the streaming arm of FX. This gives you on-demand access to past FX hits like Fargo and Atlanta and current favorites like The Bear and Shogun. But you could argue this is also Hulu with Live TV’s biggest disadvantage—its on-demand catalog is not all that different from FX’s live offerings, especially now that FX is airing plenty of Marvel and Star Wars movies, which are already available on Disney+.
It caps you at two simultaneous streams, the fewest of the big live-TV services; lifting that cap costs about $10 more a month.
Hulu + Live TV plans
Our breakdown of Hulu + Live TV →
FX is on YouTube TV, and you can watch it free for YouTube TV's 7-day free trial. Cancel before it ends and you pay nothing.
A cursory search will reveal just how many YouTube TV users have filed complaints about FX’s inconsistent picture quality on the streaming service. So if you value HD streaming, this may not be for you. Still, YouTube TV’s wide variety of channels, unlimited DVR, and easy-to-use interface make it a worthy contender in this list.
At around $83 a month it's one of the priciest options, and add-ons push the bill past $100 fast.
YouTube TV plans
No, not free. Spectrum TV Choice carries FX but has no free trial, so you pay from day one. At $53.19/mo it's the second-cheapest way to watch FX on this list.
Spectrum TV Choice is a step up from Spectrum TV Stream. It allows you to choose 15 channels on your lineup and lets you change your selection monthly, making it a good option for experimental viewers. It also offers local channels, but their availability varies depending on your location. Unfortunately, like Stream, it’s exclusive to Spectrum internet users. You’d also need to pay extra ($5) for DVR.
The advertised $30 nearly doubles at checkout: a compulsory broadcast fee of up to $23.20 lands on top, before taxes. You also need Spectrum internet at a serviceable address, and you usually have to sign up by phone.
Spectrum TV Choice plans
Our breakdown of Spectrum TV Choice →
Yes, but on demand only. Disney+ carries FX’s shows on demand, since Disney owns both. You get the back catalog to stream any time; you just don’t get the live feed or its schedule.
Disney+ merged with Hulu into one app in 2025, so everything Disney owns now streams here on demand.
The honest way to watch FX for free is a free trial, and the trick is not to spend them one at a time. Start one, then start the next when it ends, and you can string together a few weeks of free live TV back to back, usually enough to cover a tournament or a playoff run without paying for a month.
If you're cutting cable for FX, odds are you want ABC too. It's a sister channel, so every service above that carries FX carries ABC as well, and the same free trials get you both. See our full guide to watching ABC without cable for the per-service breakdown.
| Service | From | Free trial | Plans | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| DIRECTV |
$89.99/mo | 5 days | 4 | Get it |
| Sling TV |
$45.99/mo | None | 3 | Get it |
| Fubo |
$79.99/mo | 7 days | 2 | Get it |
| Hulu + Live TV |
$89.99/mo | 3 days | 2 | Get it |
| YouTube TV |
$82.99/mo | 7 days | 2 | Get it |
| Spectrum TV Choice |
$53.19/mo | None | 1 | Get it |
FX and the US services that carry it are geo-locked to the United States, so your login stops working the moment you leave the country. A VPN fixes that: connect to a US server and the service sees a US address again. The catch is that streaming platforms actively block most VPN traffic, so the VPN you pick matters far more than the service does. These three reliably get back in:
A huge US server network (thousands of IPs across 15-plus cities) with SmartPlay DNS baked into every server, so streaming just works without extra setup. The best value of the top tier on a two-year plan.
Best for streaming FX with: Hulu + Live TV, Sling TV
Get NordVPN →The budget pick, and the one to get if the whole household travels: it allows unlimited simultaneous devices on one account, plus a Smart DNS for TVs. Reliable with the on-demand and lifestyle services.
Best for streaming FX with: Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV
Get Surfshark →Whichever you pick, connect to a US city first, then sign in to FX or the service that carries it as normal. Choose a VPN with a money-back window so you can confirm it un-blocks FX before you commit.
No. FX is a cable channel and doesn't broadcast over the air, so an antenna can't pick it up. An antenna only gets the free broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX, PBS, The CW), which pair nicely with one of the services above; check which of those reach your address here.
Every service that carries FX runs on the major streaming platforms, so you can watch on just about any TV, phone, or console. Here's how, device by device:
On Roku, you can watch FX through DIRECTV, Sling TV, Fubo, Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV, and Spectrum TV Choice. To set it up, add the channel from the Roku Channel Store, sign in, and open FX in the live guide.
On Amazon Fire TV, you can watch FX through DIRECTV, Sling TV, Fubo, Hulu + Live TV, and YouTube TV. The gap: Spectrum TV Choice doesn't offer a Amazon Fire TV app. To set it up, download the app from the Amazon Appstore, sign in, and open FX in the live guide.
On Apple TV, you can watch FX through DIRECTV, Sling TV, Fubo, Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV, and Spectrum TV Choice. To set it up, install the app from the App Store, sign in, and open FX in the live guide.
On Android TV & Google TV, you can watch FX through DIRECTV, Sling TV, Fubo, Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV, and Spectrum TV Choice. To set it up, grab the app from the Google Play Store, sign in, and open FX in the live guide.
On Chromecast, you can watch FX through Sling TV, Fubo, and Hulu + Live TV. The gap: DIRECTV, YouTube TV, and Spectrum TV Choice don't offer a Chromecast app. To set it up, cast it from your phone or use the built-in Google TV app, sign in, and open FX in the live guide.
On Samsung & LG smart TVs, you can watch FX through DIRECTV, Sling TV, Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV, and Spectrum TV Choice. The gap: Fubo doesn't offer a Samsung & LG smart TVs app. To set it up, install the app from your TV's own store (Tizen or webOS), sign in, and open FX in the live guide.
On phones & tablets, you can watch FX through DIRECTV, Sling TV, Fubo, Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV, and Spectrum TV Choice. To set it up, download the app from the App Store or Google Play, sign in, and open FX in the live guide.
On game consoles, you can watch FX through Sling TV, Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV, and Spectrum TV Choice. The gap: DIRECTV and Fubo don't offer a game consoles app. To set it up, download the app from the Xbox or PlayStation store, sign in, and open FX in the live guide.
Cheapest is the question everyone starts with, and it's the wrong place to stop. A $35 plan that drops FX the month after you sign up hasn't saved you anything. So the first number we pay attention to is the real one, what you owe after the introductory month ends, not the figure in the ad. From there it comes down to whether the channels you actually want sit in the base plan or get stranded in an add-on, how the service behaves day to day (a slow app and a useless DVR wear on you faster than you'd expect), and how much of a fight it puts up when you decide to leave.
Whatever lands at the top of a list like this is the service that gets most of that right for the most people. Once in a while that's also the cheapest one. Usually it isn't.
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The people who test, price-check, and update our cord-cutting coverage.
Four criteria, each out of 100. The overall score is their weighted average: content 38%, value 27%, apps 22%, streaming quality 13%.
Value for money
0The most expensive service of its kind.
100The cheapest service of its kind.
Content quality
0None of the ten most-watched cable channels, or nothing from our recommended list.
100All ten channels, or the deepest catalog of titles we recommend.
Apps and devices
0A one-star app that runs on none of the 12 major devices.
100Five-star apps on all 12 major devices.
Streaming quality
0Below 720p.
1004K on the plan we price.
Services are compared only against others of the same type and price range, so a full live TV package is never ranked against a single-channel app. Read the full methodology →