If you’re trying and failing to download BBC shows onto your laptop today you are definitely not alone. The popular streaming platform has made a major change which means fans can no longer use the BBC iPlayer Downloads application for PC and Mac. It’s a dramatic update to the BBC’s terms that comes into force from today Tuesday, March 12.
The BBC says it has made the “difficult decision” due to the amount of people still using it and the costs required to keep things running. Clearly users numbers don’t warrant the expense but that will be of little comfort to those who still enjoy downloading programmes to watch when away from Wi-Fi or a data connection.
Here are the devices affected by the change.
• All Windows PCs including those running Windows 10 and Windows 11 operating systems.
• All Apple computers including the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro
If you have already downloaded a swathe of content onto your device there is some better news with the BBC confirming that it will still allow shows to be viewed until Monday 8 April. After this date, the whole app will stop working and nothing in the downloads folder will work.
It is worth noting that the downloads block doesn’t mean you can’t watch iPlayer on your Mac or Windows PC. Streaming will continue to work for the foreseeable future.
“This does not affect downloads on the BBC iPlayer mobile or tablet apps, and viewers can continue to stream programmes on BBC iPlayer on their PCs and Macs,” the BBC confirmed.
One final thing to remember is if you are heading away on a long flight and want iPlayer access to watch shows such as The Apprentice offline, the app on phones and tablets will continue to work as normal.
