How To Stream US Television Shows While Traveling Overseas

In this day and age, not being able to stream and binge-watch your favorite series whenever you want seems like a distant memory.

But if you happen to be travelling abroad, you might run into this exact problem in the form of: “‘unfortunately, this content is not available in your country.”

Fortunately, there is a way to get around this through the use of a USA VPN – a small application that is a frequent traveler’s best friend.

The best way to stream US television shows abroad is to “trick” the streaming services into thinking your in the United States. A VPN will allow you to “fake” your location by changing your IP address and tunneling your date through their servers.

VPNs can unblock content that is otherwise restricted by content providers. This is due to VPN providers giving users the appearance of an IP address in a country where that blocked content is not restricted. Content providers are therefore unaware that users are accessing content from somewhere they should not be.

For example, if an American Netflix customer is trying to stream US television shows abroad, it is possible to do so by establishing a VPN that connects to a server in the States. This means that the user and its VPN gives Netflix the impression that they are actually in the US where content from the provider is accessible.

Why Do You Need a VPN?

There are several reasons why a VPN is needed to watch American TV overseas.

Geo-Restrictions – Some streaming services limit where some of the shows in their catalog can be viewed. This can be for legal reasons or because of licensing agreements that the service has with other broadcasting and production companies. They have contracts in place that stipulate exactly where content can be seen

Pricing Contracts – Money is another reason for streaming services to curtail where their shows can be seen. Companies like Netflix charge different amounts in different countries

Government Censorship – In countries with stringent media policies and censorship laws, inhabitants are committing an illegal offense by watching shows that would be banned under that country’s censorship policy. This is an issue in countries like Russia or China

Illegal Content – In a similar vein, but one that is more widely understood around the world is a block on malicious or illegal content. This could be due to the content being inappropriate but also because it could contain hidden viruses that wreak havoc on personal computers and their subsequent wider net.

Having a VPN means you can navigate around these restraints, while also staying safe online.

What Makes a Good VPN?

When we were reviewing the VPN providers, we considered a number of factors.

Connection Speed – Watching your favorite US TV series in chunks of 5-minute intervals so that your show can reload and buffer, is perhaps one of the greatest first world problems out there. A fast VPN is imperative to stop this from occurring

Number of Servers – The more servers a VPN provider offers, the more easily it can connect you so that you can start to stream TV shows quickly

Server Location – It is no good signing up to a VPN provider that does not have a server in the US as this will making watching American TV overseas impossible. The same is true if you want to watch UK TV shows online – your VPN provider will need a UK server

Privacy – Staying anonymous whilst online is important to most people these days so we examined the logging policies, encryption, and confidentiality of providers when weighing up the best ways to watch TV from other countries online

Price – Considering the cost comes into any online purchase, not least for a service that you will repeatedly pay for if the service is good enough. You can, of course, get VPN providers that offer their services for free, but this often comes at the price of speed as well as your anonymity and security VPNs do not have to cost a lot- making watching American TV in Europe via the internet a very real possibility.

Now that you understand how to watch US TV from outside the US, check out our top picks for those much-needed VPNs.

Best VPNs to Stream US TV Abroad

#1 ExpressVPN – Special Deal (49% savings on annual subscription)

ExpressVPN often tops the charts of VPN providers, and for good reason. It allows for streaming blocked content from many locations to pretty much whatever country you are in. It has a robust security policy in place meaning you can be confident that your privacy is in safe hands whilst using the application.

Importantly, it has servers in a massive 94 countries across the globe. The number of actual servers it has is over 2000, which means that it is extremely fast and it offers unlimited bandwidth with absolutely no throttling involved.

Additionally, it offers a 30-day money back guarantee, making it hard to beat.

Price

• $12.95/month for one month
• $9.99/month for six months
• $6.67/month for twelve months plus three months free!

Sign up with ExpressVPN here.

#2 NordVPN

NordVPN’s longer subscription offers are very good value when the provider’s speed is taken into account. It can just about rival ExpressVPN in terms of quality given that it has nearly 4000 servers dotted around the world.

In addition to its highly reputable speed its service is one of the most secure, as well as having a money back guarantee if you are not happy after a month of use. This is a great option for all those who want to watch American TV overseas.

Price

• $11.95/month for one month
• $6.99/month for 12 months
• $3.99/month for two years

Sign up with NordVPN here.

#3 ProtonVPN

Traveling abroad is made much simpler no matter where you’re headed when you can rely on ProtonVPN. With over 450 servers in 33 countries, you can connect from anywhere at any time. This Swiss-based VPN pays great attention to detail especially when it comes to how much of your data is collected. Whilst other VPN companies claim to keep zero logs, this is one of the rare ones that do.

“ProtonVPN respects its users’ privacy and enforces a No Logs policy. This means your VPN connections remain private and we do not store information about your connections or the websites you visit.

For the purpose of securing your account and making sure it’s you who is signing in, we store a single timestamp of your account’s most recent login. Again, we do not store any information about where you signed in from or how long you were logged in.”

Although there is no 24-hour live chat service, when you’re traveling you can still email the customer service team or submit a ticket and you should get a reply within 24 hours. Most problems can be solved just by heading over to the ProtonVPN website and checking out the FAQs or troubleshooting sections.

If you want to watch American shows overseas, ProtonVPN is a solid option.

Price:

• Free
• Basic plan: $4
• Plus plan: $8
• Visionary plan: $24

Sign up with ProtonVPN here.

#4 Surfshark

Surfshark is a fantastic VPN provider for a whole host of reasons and purposes. None more so than when you are traveling from outside the USA and want to keep up to date with your favorite TV shows that are subject to geo restrictions on a broadcaster’s website and streaming service. The reason we like Surfshark so much is the vast amount of US servers it has that can provide subscribers with a US IP address every time they log into their account.

It also has a strict and stringent approach to its customer security through the use of a no logs policy as well as an OpenVPN protocol, Kill Switch and other security features. Additionally, it is one of the few capable VPN providers that offers users the ability to connect an unlimited amount of devices at the same time. This is great news for families where members are often abroad but also have a number of different devices that they like to use while traveling.

Finally, its 30-day money back guarantee, which means they refund subscribers in full with no questions asked, is further proof that they have confidence in the product offering.

Price

• Starting from as low as $1.99

Sign up with Surfshark here.

#5 Cyberghost

Cyberghost is pretty close to ExpressVPN in the service it provides and if you sign up for 12 months, it certainly is an attractive offer at just $2.75 a month. When compared to ExpressVPN, it only has a slightly lower number of server locations worldwide, and slightly slower speeds to stream TV shows.

However, it is still pretty fastand is also very safe and secure, so it’s a dependable option for those streaming TV in Mexico or anywhere else life takes you. For those interested in the technology, CyberGhost has an incredible 256-bit AES encryption, a kill switch and stringent DNS and IP policies so that logging into NetFlix anywhere in the world is possible.

It also offers a 45-day money back guarantee which gives you time to see whether its +3,000 servers in 59 countries are enough for your online streaming TV needs. They also offer a 7 day free trial with no restrictions to see if it works for you with its unlimited bandwidth and P2P file sharing options.

Price

• $12.99/month for one month.
• $7.99/month for 3 months.
• $3.50/month for 12 months.

Sign up with Cyberghost here.

How to Watch SlingTV From Abroad

If you don’t want to purchase a cable TV subscription, you can get Sling TV. Accessing it from outside of the US is easy enough with a VPN.  

A VPN will be able to encrypt all of your internet traffic and re-route it through to a different location of your choosing. If you want access to Sling TV, for example, you just have to connect to a server within the US and all your doors will then be wide open. It really is as easy as that.

Using a VPN to watch SlingTV is easy. Simply choose your VPN of choice, sign up with them, install, log in and hit that “connect” button.

From there you will have complete access to both the Sling TV website and all of the channels they offer.

Is It Worthwhile?

A VPN is not only worthwhile, but necessary and invaluable if you want to stream US television shows or movies from abroad. As a side benefit it can also keep you safe from hackers, thieves and unwanted prying eyes by encrypting your traffic so no one can see it.