The World Cup 2026 kicks off this week and you’re surprisingly restricted within the methods you possibly can watch it in 4K.
Regardless of it being 2026, these watching the World Cup within the UK can solely watch the event in Extremely HD on only one streaming service. That’s BBC iPlayer, as ITVX stays unable to supply the upper high quality (regardless of some guides saying it is going to).
You’ll have to use the iPlayer app as there’s nonetheless no BBC channel which broadcasts in 4K. The Beeb shall be displaying all of its 54 matches (simply over half the 104 for the entire event) in what it sometimes refers to as ‘Extremely HD’ or ‘UHD’ reasonably than 4K.
These 54 video games will embrace the World Cup last on 19 July (additionally on ITV) and can embrace England’s video games within the final 32, final 16 and semi-final in the event that they get that far within the event.
Right here’s watch World Cup matches in 4K on BBC iPlayer
As talked about, you possibly can’t simply change your TV to the proper BBC channel by way of the aerial or satellite tv for pc broadcast and watch in 4K. As an alternative, there are a couple of hoops to leap via and bins to tick:
- A suitable 4K TV or streaming gadget – most huge manufacturers work, together with Samsung, LG, Hisense, Roku, Amazon Fireplace and extra. Verify the complete checklist right here. Sky Q, internet browsers, telephones, and tablets will not be supported.
- Quick sufficient web – the BBC says it must be 24Mbps for the ‘full 3840 pixel Extremely HD expertise’, or 12Mbps for lower-res 2560p.
- A BBC account – join free should you don’t have already got one.
- A legitimate TV license – you’ll want a present license to look at dwell TV legally.
Upon getting all of the above saved, make sure that your iPlayer video high quality is ready to ‘Greatest High quality’ within the settings. Then look out for the UHD icons on World Cup streams.
BBC
While you click on okay on a match, it might give you completely different high quality choices, so select Extremely HD. If you wish to watch in HDR, you’ll want a TV that helps HLG (hybrid log gamma), which is the usual used for iPlayer, so verify your gadget specs.
Observe that the supply feed is in HD, so watching World Cup matches on iPlayer in Extremely HD will imply viewing upscaled content material reasonably than native 4K.