Foxtel Go brings streaming TV to iPhone

Foxtel Go can now be viewed on the iPhone, bringing live TV, sport and movies to the small screen.

The service, which requires a standard residential Foxtel subscription, will soon feature over 50 channels after Foxtel adds 3 news sports channels at the beginning of March. The app itself is free to download and customers use their existing Foxtel credentials to login.

Designed to complement the core TV service, the Foxtel Go app includes only a selection of the channels Foxtel has in its regular packages. Some of these include Fox 8, National Geographic, Lifestyle Food, Disney and a number of movie channels.

There channels are split into live streaming and catch-up versions, with only some channels offering both options.

The app also lets users browse upcoming programs via an integrated EPG, and set recordings that will be activated on their Foxtel set-top boxes.

Data gobbler

Having the service on smartphones will raise concerns about data usage and bill shock for people using Foxtel Go. On its site, Foxtel estimates that viewing streaming content will use between 155- and 300MB per hour on a 3G connection. Over Wi-Fi the stream is better quality and can use up to 910 MB per hour.

This is a first for iPhones, but a first for Foxtel on mobile phones. Telstra has offered a basic streaming Foxtel-branded service for several years, though this service requires a separate subscription and offers far fewer channels.