© ALPHASPIRIT / STOCK.ADOBE.COM

Make it your own

Tips to improve your viewing experience on your favourite video streaming services

by MARC SALTZMAN

Whether you’ve traded cable for streaming services entirely or you simply augment your existing TV service with the likes of Netflix, Apple TV+, Disney+ and others, the following tips can help you optimize your viewing experience and help you save money:

Stream smoother. If it’s taking too long for videos to load or they look choppy or pixelated, your TV may be too far from your router. If you can, move the router closer to your TV, restart your Wi-Fi connection or consider upgrading your router to a newer model that supports greater bandwidth (and multiple devices).

Find extras. Many services have extra content to unlock, such as deleted scenes, gag reels and behind-the-scenes features. While it varies among the services, the icon to launch extra content is usually underneath the “Play” button. Some services, such as Netflix, have interactive games to play, too.

Travel tip. Are you going to be on a plane for a few hours? Download TV shows and movies to watch offline, so you don’t need to pay the airline for internet access. Similarly, downloading content is ideal to avoid cellular data charges during outings like family road trips.

Subtitles and overdubs. Whether you’re deaf, hard of hearing or having trouble understanding accents, enable closed captions. In most cases you can even tweak the size and colour of the font. If your mother tongue isn’t English, you may also choose one of a few available language overdubs.

Enable parental controls. If you don’t want younger viewers in your home to watch inappropriate shows or movies, you can set up a PIN code on select content. How you do it depends on the service, but it’s usually found in the “Settings” area.

Shortcuts. Some streaming services offer shortcuts when their content is being watched on a computer. With Netflix, for example, F is for Full-Screen, M is Mute and tapping the Left/Right arrows lets you skip 10 seconds forward or back.

Spend less. Before committing to a service, take advantage of its free trials to see if you like the content. Or, if there’s one TV series you want to binge, do it within the trial period, before cancelling.

---