Another year of March Madness is upon us, and if you’ve managed to consolidate your streaming subscriptions and cut ties with your cable company, you might be wondering how to watch the men’s NCAA tournament. We’re here to help.
The NCAA March Madness men’s and women’s basketball tournaments commence in mid-March and runs through the beginning of April. The 2023 NCAA tournaments—which consist of the First Four, Rounds 1 and 2, Sweet 16, Elite Eight, Final Four, and the national championship game—begin on March 14 (men’s) and March 15 (women’s). The championship games are on April 2 (women’s) and April 4 (men’s).
How can you watch March Madness without cable?
If you don’t have cable, you can opt for a streaming service like SlingTV or Hulu + Live TV, which carry all the channels that March Madness will air on—CBS, TBS, TNT, and TruTV for the men’s games, and ABC, ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNews and ESPNU for the women’s games. Otherwise, a Paramount+ subscription will give you access to a majority of the games, and other streaming services designed to replace cable like FuboTV carry some of the channels you’ll need.
Hulu + Live TV
You can watch March Madness through the live viewing component of Hulu + Live TV. Hulu + Live TV expands a regular Hulu subscription into a combination of Hulu’s regular content and live television, replicating the benefits of having a cable subscription. You can start a week-long free trial with Hulu + Live TV, or sign up for the service for $69.99/month.
Sign up for Hulu + Live TVSlingTV
SlingTV is historically Reviewed Editor-in-Chief Dave Kender’s favorite way to tune in for March Madness. He prefers to jump onto the subscription for the duration of the event, and then cancel, but if this is your first time signing up you can get access to a free trial window. With a Sling Blue package for SlingTV, you can access March Madness through NBC, as well as 35+ other channels for $35/month.
Sign up for SlingTVParamount+
Paramount+ is the subscription streaming service from ViacomCBS that replaced CBS All Access in March of 2021, offering live CBS streaming (meaning you can catch March Madness there), as well as TV shows and movies from the CBS network, BET, Nickelodeon, MTV, Comedy Central, Paramount Pictures and more starting at $4.99 a month. If you’d like uninterrupted streaming, the ad-free version costs $9.99 a month. When you sign up, you can also get Paramount+ Premium with Showtime for $11.99.
Sign up for Paramount+FuboTV
You can catch March Madness and more through live channels with a FuboTV subscription, which offers live viewing of more than 100 cable channels within its basic subscription package for $64.99/month. FuboTV is available on compatible mobile devices, computer browsers, and streaming devices like Apple TV, Roku, Amazon Fire Stick, and more.
Sign up for FuboTVWhat’s the schedule for March Madness?
For the men’s tournament, the games will proceed in the following order:
- Selections Sunday: March 12 (8 p.m. ET on ESPN)
- The First Four: March 15-16
- The first round: March 17-18
- The second round: March 19-20
- The Sweet 16: March 24-25
- The Elite Eight: March 26-27
- The Final Four: March 31 (7 and 9:30 p.m. ET on ESPN).
- NCAA championship game: April 2 (3 p.m. ET on ABC).
The women’s tournament will take place over the following dates:
- Selection Sunday: Sunday, March 12 (6 p.m. ET on CBS)
- First Four: March 14-15
- The first round: March 16-17
- The second round: March 18-19
- The Sweet 16: March 23-24
- The Elite Eight: March 25-26
- The Final Four: April 1
- NCAA championship game: April 3
