The streaming revolution is clearly here to stay, with millions of us switching to this way of watching content online rather than using a dish or old-fashioned aerial. Sky now says that devices such as Sky Glass and Sky Stream make up the majority of new sales, and the new Freely service – which comes built into a swathe of TVs – continues to get more features and extra channels.
Streaming has huge advantages over traditional telly. It offers a simple DIY set-up with no need for engineers to visit, there are more things to watch, and it’s not affected by weather conditions outside.
However, for all of those good things, there is still one glaring issue, and that’s lag.
When watching live TV, those with streaming boxes or internet-connected TVs are around 30-40 seconds behind. That’s not really an issue when watching soap operas, quiz shows or the news, but it can be hugely annoying for sports fans.
When a goal hits the back of the net, the roar from the local pub or texts arriving from friends and family can ruin things if your TV is so far behind.
Sky has already begun to address this latency issue with some of its premium sporting content only a matter of seconds behind the real live action.
Now the BBC has confirmed that it is working on something similar, with a test already taking place across the UK.
“The delay on iPlayer has reduced significantly in recent times but is still around 40 seconds,” the BBC explained.
“Many streaming services today have similar delays. On our broadcast services the end to end delay is just 8-10 seconds – a significant difference.
“For some content, viewers may not notice, but for live sport and for live events with a social media following, delays can detract from the viewing experience.
“We are aiming to address these delays whilst maintaining a high quality of experience through our work on ‘low latency streaming’.”
The BBC is now offering iPlayer users the chance to test this update.
Homes with 3rd and 2nd generation Amazon Fire TV Sticks, along with owners of Samsung’s CU8000 and CU8500 TVs can head to their settings and switch on the iPlayer Beta experience.
This test version will then show streams with less lag.
The BBC says that the initial trial will run on BBC Two between 9am and 5pm for viewers who have enabled ‘iPlayer beta’ in settings and have set their location to England or Scotland.
“This trial is to help us understand how well low latency streaming can cope with the real world performance of our viewers’ internet connections. We are starting small but hope to expand the trial as we gain confidence in its performance,” the BBC added.