JioCinema is relatively new to the OTT world in India but it’s already the talk of the town with its free streaming of the IPL (Indian Premier League). Reliance-backed JioCinema started out by streaming the FIFA World Cup for free for all users in India last year, but things took a massive turn with IPL, for which Reliance has streaming rights till 2027. Jio has followed up on the hype by signing content agreements with Warner Bros. that will bring the entire HBO catalogue to JioCinema, taking away a huge chunk of Disney+ Hotstar’s user base, over 4.6 million subscribers, to be precise.
For the unversed, HBO content is quite popular with shows like Game of Thrones, House of Dragon, Succession in India. Soon after announcing its tie-up with Warner Bros., HBO and Max Originals, JioCinema has launched a single Rs 999 premium subscription model. While most Hindi content on JioCinema still remains free, the HBO content is only available for premium users.
JioCinema Premium launched in India: should you buy?
While the JioCinema subscription might sound attractive on paper thanks to the inclusion of Warner Bros., HBO, and IPL content, we believe the deal is not the best at the moment. Here are the reasons why you should not buy the JioCinema premium plan.
Lack of all HBO shows: The main reason is that a lot of HBO hit shows like ‘The Wire’, ‘The Sopranos’, ‘Veep’, ‘Euphoria’ and others are still not available on the platform. If you were planning to sign up for JioCinema paid plan just for HBO content, we advise you against it, as Jio is still updating its catalog. Ideally, these shows should be added over time but nothing can be said for certain.
There were rumours on Twitetr that JioCinema had censored shows like Game of Thrones, but that turned out to be untrue.
IPL is already free: IPL is already free to all users regardless of any telecom network you are using, be it Airtel or Vodafone Idea. Outside of HBO content, most JioCinema content is already free for Jio telecom users including Bollywood movies like Vikram Vedha.
No bundle offer yet: Jio is also not offering any discount for Jio subscribers but there are chances that the JioCinema Premium subscription could be bundled with Jio prepaid/post plans soon, so Jio subscribers should wait for sure.
Streaming quality: Though Jio is promising the highest quality streaming support, early reports from those who’ve subscribed claim that the quality is capped at 1080p for now. Not just that, there appear to be some issues with the streaming support on different screens. For instance, when streaming shows like Game of Thrones, there is no option to set optimum video quality and dark environments appeared faded and the content looked pixelated.
New Jio OTT app launching?
There are speculations that Jio already has a separate OTT app ready and is waiting for the IPL season to end to launch it officially on a grand scale. This dedicated app will have entire HBO content and a lot of other original shows that were recently showcased at the Jio Studios event. Additionally, a lot of already existing Jio, Voot and Paramount content will also be made available.
