Not having a DVR means you don’t have any recourse for disappearing shows or rules against ad-skipping. And when you launch these programs, you’ll often get a message saying you’re not allowed to fast forward through commercials. The NBC show This is Us, for instance, offers every episode on demand, but The Good Place (also on NBC) only covers the current season. In lieu of DVR, Spectrum provides an on-demand video catalog, but the selection you’ll get for any given program is a crapshoot. Spectrum’s hardware alone could cost you more than the actual TV service.

For multi-room DVR, the cost climbs to $35 with two boxes, and $7.50 for each additional box after that. You can rent a DVR box instead of using Spectrum’s apps, but just a single box will set you back an extra $20.50 per month. Spectrum TV Choice’s biggest drawback is its lack of DVR service for streaming devices. Perusing Spectrum’s on-demand menu means running into a lot of programs and episodes you can’t watch. Still, using a bunch of disparate apps is less convenient than having everything in one place. These apps don’t have the same viewing restrictions, and some of them even support 60-frames-per-second video. The good news is that you can use Spectrum TV Choice to log into individual network apps, such as ESPN and Fox Now. You’ll need to do a lot of scrolling just to find things that you’re allowed to watch, and the whole exercise feels like an upsell to a proper cable package. Worst of all, Spectrum’s on-demand menus continue to list content from channels you don’t pay for, as signified with a key icon.Many live channels don’t work on mobile devices, and the app doesn’t work at all on TV devices. Your ability to use Spectrum’s service outside the home is also limited.Oddly enough, some channels did support 60 frames per second when I tried Spectrum TV Choice last year, but they no longer do. Video quality was limited to 30 frames per second on every channel I tested, meaning you won’t get smooth motion for live sports, news, and talk shows.Spectrum’s apps work well on a basic level, but they do have a few annoyances and limitations: Roku’s mini-guide makes channel-flipping easy.

Spectrum list of tv channels