Asking for an IPTV Free Trial must be the first step you take when trying to subscribe to any streaming service. You have worked for the money and for sure you are entitled to evaluate the service before joining. There are things to pay attention to while
Every honest and responsible IPTV provider should offer IPTV free trial at least for 24 hours to all new customers. That is the minimum period which should be provided. The ideal period would be 48 hours. Now this trial, although it is free, is the actual example of the paid subscription. From the buyer's perspective, It should include all the features that the provider is promising on the paid account. From provider's eyes, it is the most important step to convince a customer to pay for the service.
IPTV Free Trial - Live TV and VOD
There are levels of expectations from an IPTV free test account:
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The period of the IPTV free trial and the right time to ask for it
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Content of the IPTV free trial
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Things to do and pay attention to while on IPTV free trial
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Installation of the IPTV free trial
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Things to pay attention to when upgrading from the IPTV free trial to paid subscription
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Services provided along side the IPTV free trial service by the provider
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Provider's own custom application
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The period of the IPTV free trial and the right time to ask for it
The ideal period for an IPTV trial subscription is 48 hours. That's should be enough time for any client to evaluate a service and get to know the content and the provider. However, since providers are giving this for free, it is logical to be sensitive about it. In other words, IPTV providers tend to check trial requests carefully and make sure this free service is not being abused. Therefore, a customer should schedule the trial period before request for it to make sure they could get the best out of it. Usually the listing of the channels is long and takes time to evaluate them patiently. It is best to request for the IPTV free trial right before hot live events so you could evaluate the service at least during one live event. This will show how the provider's servers and feed perform during peak hours. Clients from the UK should also test the service during English Premier League to make sure there are no EPL Blocks unless provider's service has built-in vpn connection or the client already has a VPN.
There are IPTV providers who tend to close free trials at least 24 hours before live events: 1-to avoid the abuse of the free trial for live events 2-to avoid certain "parties" getting their hands on it for scanning their IPs during events.
Piece of advice, if a provider gives away free trials like halloween candies, think twice before joining that service.
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Content of the IPTV free trial
I did mention this on another article: a provider MUST be open and honest. An IPTV free trial should be a touch of the exact same service a client is going to get through the paid service. Things like "Those channels are VIP and not available during trial" ... I'm sorry, BS! Whatever a provider is going to offer to a paid client, should also provide through free test account, end of discussion. If you are a client and see a provider treat you otherwise, close the page and move to the next one.
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Things to do and pay attention to while on IPTV free trial
Most important thing to do while evaluating an IPTV free trial service, is to test the content patiently. Focus on the channels which are you favorite not the total amount of channels included. If you want NFL channels to work spot on, focus on those during live event, no matter the provider offers 1000 channels or 30000 channels.
Another thing you should do during the free trial period is to contact support, especially during peak hours, hot live events or weekends when you know they are busy. Provider's response time is key.
For security reasons, some providers prefer applying security measures on their IPTV test account including ISP Lock, IP Lock, Country Lock and User Agent Lock.
ISP Lock:
It detects the ISP of the first connection attempt made to the free trial and locks it to the trial, meaning only that ISP is allowed to use that test account. For instance if you are using Virgin Media UK as your ISP while trying to make the first connection to the trial, ISP lock records that and you can not, for instance, connect a VPN and run the account.
IP Lock:
Same as above only locks the Internet IP Address. If you want to know your Internet IP address, you can check this website.
Country Lock:
Same as above only locks the country.
User Agent Lock:
Each IPTV player app has a user agent showing what type of an app/software they are. The IPTV CMS can detect the agent and some providers lock that to a trial. For instance you can't run the free trial on Smart IPTV app on Samsung TV and then go and run it on Enigma 2 box although you are using the same ISP, IP and country.
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Installation of the IPTV free trial
Once the trial received, it is time to install it on your device. Depending on the make, model and the operating system of the device, the IPTV application available for it may differ. Below I am going to list most of the common applications for the various devices. Recommendations below are currently working for IPTV users.
-Android and Generic Android
Among IPTV users, Android devices are one of the commonly used devices. The range of devices are Phones, Tablets, TV Boxes, Sticks and Smart TVs all with android operating system and usually Google Play Store available. Generic android devices are the ones like Fire TV Sticks e.g. Amazon Firestick, where you do not have access to Google Play Store yet thanks to the Android operating system inside these devices, you can still install Android applications either directly from the available Appstore on the device or by side-loading method to test the IPTV test account you have received from them. Let me provide details for each:
--Android Phones and Tablets
Choices are a lot, full of variety and depending on your taste in the application look or features, you can pick different apps. IPTV Smarters Pro is one of the well-known ones which has support for EPG, Picons, Xtream Codes API for entering the streaming line details from IPTV trial easily and few other features. This app is removed from Google Play Store so Read this guide for Installing IPTV Smarters Pro on Android devices by side-loading. Another great application would be XCIPTV Player which is currently available on Play Store and you can checkout this guide on XCIPTV player installation on Android devices. The list is endless but these two should be good examples.
--Android TV Boxes
Mi TV Boxes, Nvidia Shields or any Android setup box falls into this category. The best application to use here would be TiviMate although other apps like Smart IPTV are available. It has absolutely anything that you may desire, from EPG, Picons to playback settings to scheduled recordings. It is a paid application if you want the premium features but it is the right investment. Here is the best TiviMate installation guide you can find online. There are other choices like XCIPTV Player or even Smart IPTV and many other applications but TiviMate is the best choice on Android TV Boxes.
--Fire TV Stick/Cube
Almost all android applications can be installed on these devices through side-loading. You can click on any of these guides: IPTV Smarters Pro, TiviMate, Smart IPTV
-Apple
iPhone, iPad and Apple TV box are the devices we speak about here, the ones with iOS operating system inside. Since App Store is in charge of application installation here, the choices are limited. At the moment, Smarters Player Lite is working fine. The IPTV application from WHMCS masters who made IPTV Smarters Pro but due to this app being removed from App Store, they renamed it to Smarters Player Lite so the functionality is the same.
-Smart TV (Closed-Source)
The notorious Samsung and LG Smart TVs are the bad boys we are addressing here. There is no flexibility in operating systems of these devices and basically they were not made for IPTV purposes. However, the App Market on Samsung and Content Store on LGTV have few IPTV applications available to install IPTV free trial on. Smart IPTV is one of them. The other would be Smart STB for which can read this thorough guide on how to install Smart STB on Smart TV. The application is paid. IPTV Smarters Pro also available on these TVs in most regions.
-PC (Personal Computer / Laptop)
Sometimes you are traveling and your Laptop is the only hardware available to you or you just want to watch on your laptop or PC because of the bigger screen size. There are two common options available. One would be running IPTV on your web browser using IPTV Smarters Web Player. Another would be VLC Media Player. You can read this guide to understand how you can install and use VLC on PC or Laptop.
-Enigma 2
One day, there should be a campaign to convince Enigma 2 users that these devices are not made and suitable for IPTV trial or paid service. But some users still don't listen and want to run IPTV right beside their satellite channel. To do that, read this guide for Jedi Xtream Playlist Maker. Another method would be through X-Streamity which can be downloaded and installed from your Enigma 2 plugin section.
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Things to pay attention to when upgrading from the IPTV free trial to paid subscription
So the free trial ran fine and you have come to a decision that this service is right for you. When you pay for the service, the ideal scenario is that the provider upgrades the same IPTV free trial account to your paid without any changes. If the paid account is a new one, different from the trial you had, and the server address of the free trial you had is different from the new paid sub, then you can call it suspicious although it could all be the same but be vigilant.
It is always advised to start with a 1 month period unless the service is recommended to you by someone you trust who is already using it and confirms the stability.
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Services provided along side the IPTV free trial service by the provider
There are providers who take the game to the next level. We all know streaming IPTV on bare internet connection could be risky. That's why many IPTV consumers pay for high quality VPN services too to ensure safe streaming. Now, there are providers who offer free VPN alongside their IPTV free trial service. Some of them are bad due to the VPN server not being looked after, overwhelmed due to not being load-balanced properly but some are kept the right way and you can enjoy streaming the service through that VPN tunnel. If your provider offers that, thats a big thumbs up to them as this will waive the VPN costs from clients side.
Needless to say, if you go for a professional VPN, it's better. Reason is a VPN from any of those big VPN companies have various networking options with different protocols. For instance if you can find a VPN service with Wireguard protocol, or even if your IPTV provider's own VPN has Wireguard or Ikev2 protocols, that would ensure bypassing almost any network throttling which may be applied by your ISP.
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Provider's own custom application
If the IPTV provider have their own application, that would make your life easier. Reason being, if you need assistance for the service installation even during IPTV free trial, they most probably have a detailed step by step a,d sometimes a tutorial post ready to provide for their app. On the other hand, if you face issues during streaming and it may need tweaking on the player engine of the application, since the application you are using is known to the provider, they know how to guide you about it, saves both of you great amount of time.
Any questions? post it on WDS Community Forum and let us help you.