How to Watch French TV from Abroad

If you live in France, you get to enjoy TV channels such as Eurosport, Trace Urban, and TF1. And thanks to these channels, you get your regular supply of sports updates, public TV, and all the French dramas and comedy shows.

And it’s all fine as long as you’re in France. But watching your favorite shows gets difficult when you travel abroad. When you visit another country, there are some TV channels that you’ll be unable to watch. Here are some French channels that you cannot access from outside the country.

  • Pluzz: Airs all types of shows including kids’ TV programs
  • Eurosport: The best way to stay updated with sports-related news and events
  • TF1: Offers a number of French and American TV shows
  • i-Télé: News channel and helps you stay up-to-date with recent happenings
  • M6: Airs TV series, news, and other shows
  • France2, France3, France4, France5, FranceÔ: A collection of channels with each channel specializing in a certain type of content
  • Gulli: Offers content for kids, ranging from cartoon shows to educational TV
  • Play TV: Play TV is a streaming service that lets you watch several French channels

Why can’t I access French TV outside France?

It’s all in your IP. Your IP address or your Internet Protocol address is a sequence of numbers that helps you connect to the internet. Each IP address is unique and is assigned by your ISP. This IP tells the internet about your location along with some other things.

When you try to access a website that’s geo-blocked for your location, it checks your IP and doesn’t load its content for you. This is the reason you cannot access your favorite French TV shows when you’re traveling abroad.

How to bypass this block?

You can stream and watch many French channels using Play TV. Channels such as TF1, Gulli, France 1-5, LCI, and Canal+ will be available to you via the internet. All you need is a device to stream them and an active internet connection.

Play TV is an easy substitute to watching channels on an actual TV with a cable connection. However, you can’t watch Play TV when you’re outside France because it will detect and block your IP.

The solution? Use a VPN. A VPN has a network of servers all over the world. It encrypts your data and reroutes it through one of its servers. So when you connect to Play TV through a France based server, the streaming service will assume that the request is coming from within the country and let you access its TV shows.

While a VPN lets you unblock geo-restricted content, it also helps you stay safe from snoopers by encrypting your data. To unblock Play TV from outside France, follow these steps:

  1. Get a VPN connection. You can read some reviews to find out the best VPN for watching French TV. NordVPN and ExpressVPN are two good choices for that.
  2. Download the VPN app on your device and install it. If you use some other VPN than the two mentioned above, you might have to configure it manually.
  3. Connect to the VPN using a France based server.

Now you will be assigned a French IP. With this IP, you can connect to your Play TV account and continue watching all the shows you used to watch back in France.

You can also stream other French TV channels including TF1, myCanal, Canal Play, Molotov TV, 6Play, France TV, Pluzz, D8, Gulli, Eurosport, M6, and Arte.

In a nutshell

If you love French TV shows, you can stay connected and watch all sports events and stay connected with news updates even when you travel abroad. Just by using a VPN, you can get your regular French TV fix and very easily.

However, before you buy a paid subscription for a VPN, make sure it offers servers in France and fast speeds that allow seamless streaming.

There are some free VPN choices as well but since you can’t expect good speeds on free VPNs, it’s best to get a reliable VPN service that offers decent speeds.