Translation
2026 Week 3-4
Ready (or not)...Play!
Tennis Watchers
Jan 16
The season may just have started, but we already find ourselves on the start of the first major of the year. The Australian Open will kick off Saturday evening here in the states with coverage jumping over to ESPN Networks/Streams.
This will be the first slam with the newly launched ESPN subscriptions, and a few interesting items to point out. The ESPN PR page outlines its broadcast schedule and calls out ESPN + will feature all outer courts, you’ll need ESPN Unlimited or a TV provider log in to stream the three show courts courts (Rod Laver, Margaret Court, John Cain).
Admittedly, not exactly clear how this plays out compared to past experiences (personally) have always had access to a cable provider to log into ESPN if needed until this year. Drop a note in the comments with what setup you have and how this worked out for you—the potential snag we see popping up is if you are looking to stream show courts before ESPN 2’s coverage block opens up and if you stream multiple show courts at once, but you don’t have a cable provider that grants you access to ESPN Unlimited.
As referenced last week, ESPN.com/watch outlines the subscription options for you. There is a pretty big jump in price between ESPN Select and Unlimited so if you aren’t sure what you will need you may want to sign up for ESPN Select, and if you feel you are missing matches important to you, quickly upgrade to ESPN Unlimited (you are only charged the difference between the two if you this route).
Be sure to double check if ESPN Plus is part of any of your existing subscriptions (Disney/Hulu). Of note, Disney Plus subscribers will get access to Australian Open coverage for day one matches.
Tennis Channel will also air a daily recap show and match replays throughout the day.
