It's taken long enough, but now you can legally stream unlimited Hollywood movies and series on your smartphone, tablet, laptop or smart TV, here in Bangkok. We put the top competitors through a real-world comparison.
Primetime HDTV
The first streaming service to bring US movies and TV to Thailand claims to be unique in offering HD quality, DTS Audio and HeadphoneX technology.
Highlights: Minions, Pixels, Boyhood
Good: Primetime reminds you why HBO was so great back in the day. The selection, though not super up-to-date, is pretty broad and carries plenty of hits. The impressive streaming performance consumes fewer megabytes, meaning you don’t necessarily need Wi-Fi to watch a film. Plus the Thai and English dubs and subs.
Bad: It takes a while for them to upload the blockbusters, around three months from the time they leave movie theaters, but the pricier packages can get them sooner.
Cost: B199 for unlimited movies (no recent blockbusters) to B549 (or B399x12 if you pay for a full-year upfront) for two premier movies/month, plus the movie and TV series buffet.
www.goprimetime.tv
Doonee
By Thailand, for Thailand, the movies and shows on this streaming service have a heavily localized flavor.
Highlights: The Forbidden City, Prison Break
Good: It’s the only application in this roundup that lets you pay with so many options—through Line, PayPal, direct bank transfer, SMS, Visa and Mastercard or at Counter Service. The selection is packed with old Chinese and Western series. Another bonus: they often run great promotions, like unlimited access to series for B9/day and buy-3-months-get-3-months free for SCB clients.
Bad: The streaming speed is the slowest we tried. You can also only use the service from within Thailand.
Hollywood HDTV
This service offers a Hollywood-weighted film selection plus some picks from Japan.
Highlights: Conan, Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, The Godfather, Living Among the Rich
Good: The list of international box office hits is strong but only if you pay for one of the top packages, otherwise you get left with older films and series.
Bad: As the name suggests, this one’s all about American TV, so this is no place to go looking for your favorite series from Korea or European auteur cinema. They do however seem to license a few Japanese anime (Conan, Ultraman).
Cost: B199/month for the buffet part (mostly older films and series), and B300 for a better selection.
www.hollywoodhdtv.com
Iflix
This service promises access to a stockroom of Southeast Asia; Chinese, Korean and Hollywood films from Fox, Disney, Paramount, Warner Bros and MGM.
Highlights: Mr. Robot, Queen and I, My Secret Hotel, Bad Guy, How I Met Your Mother
Good: You don’t need a credit card to register for one month free. For locally produced and indie films, there’s a clear draw here thanks to the selection of Thai shows that are hard to find elsewhere. Subscribers can easily dig out Thai movies too, with Bahasa, Thai, Tagalog, Korean or Mandarin dubs and subs. Anime geek? They’ve got the license to air a few hit Japanese series.
Bad: The biggest drawback we found was for Western shows. The collection of BBC Sherlock Holmes episodes, for example, is really limited and out of date.
Hooq.tv
Here you’ll find a bit of everything, local and international, all available to watch both on- and offline.
Highlights: Ugly Betty, Gossip Girl, The Flash, Masked Rider, Hamtaro
Good: Hooq lets you check out their full movie list online without having to register. And—thank God—you can also download the movies to watch offline, but only on smartphones and tablets with the HOOQ app (a maximum of five videos can be downloaded at one time across all devices on the account).
Bad: It’s not optimized for Chrome browser, so you’ll have to go back to Firefox or Safari.
Cost: B119/month after a free 45-day trial. Only Mastercard and Visa cards are accepted.
www.hooq.tv/th
