Free yourself from your television with the XFINITY TV Go app [REVIEW]

As more and more streaming capabilities are introduced to more and more devices, I wonder what’s going to become of the phrase, “What’s on tv tonight?” I mean, you don’t even need to sit in front of a television any more to enjoy what we still call traditional television programming.

Such is the case with XFINITY’s TV Go app, available for Apple devices, Android devices and the Kindle Fire. The best I can describe the TV Go app is that it’s like carrying around your XFINITY cable subscription with you on your tablet on smartphone. So instead of sitting in front of the television, you can now watch your favorite programming while you’re on the treadmill, sitting on the deck or in any place you can dream up where you don’t have a television.

Live television

XFINITY’s TV Go app allows you to watch live television on your tablet or smartphone from any of the 50 or so available channels as long as you pay for the channel through your normal cable subscription package. So really, the only difference is that you are watching “tv” on your mobile device instead of your television.

On demand programming

Same goes with on demand content. Missed your favorite show? Just pull up the TV Go app, browse the available television shows or movies (or do a quick search) and within a few seconds you’re watching it on your tablet or smartphone.

Download for offline viewing

Some channels such as Starz and Encore even allow you to download content for viewing offline (when you aren’t connected to the Internet). You can download up to 10 programs on one device, given that your device has enough storage to hold that many programs. Perfect for that long car ride or airplane trip.

Not restricted to your house

Probably my favorite feature of all though is that you can use the TV Go app outside of your house. I have DIRECTV which has a similar app but their app requires that you are connected to the same Wi-Fi network as your DIRECTV receivers. Not so with the TV Go app. You can catch up with your favorite television shows or movies at home, at a friend’s house, in a hotel room or even at your local coffee shop.

A few other goodies

A few other goodies thrown into XFINITY’s TV Go app are the ability to bookmark programs for later so you don’t forget them, a history button so you can remember what you watched or where you left off on a recent program and parental controls to make sure your kids aren’t sneaking off on their own to watch shows you don’t want them to see.

The irony of all of the TV Go app’s features is that most people have never heard of the app and don’t know it is available to them as part of their XFINITY subscription package. If you’re one of those people, do yourself a favor and use the links I provided at the top of this post to download the TV Go app and give it a whirl.