After earlier this year teasing a 4K content viewing option, YouTube TV has officially debuted the new add-on priced at $19.99/month on top of the service’s current $65 monthly rate.
However, YouTube TV is offering 4K Plus for $9.99/month for one year after a one-month free trial for new subscribers to the add-on.
The 4K Plus package will let subscribers watch major sports events this summer in 4K, plus live content from networks like NBC and ESPN, sports like college football and basketball later this year and on-demand content from FX, Discovery Networks and Tastemade.
In addition to 4K content, the new add-on will also let users download shows to watch offline. YouTube TV is introducing the ability to save recordings from the cloud DVR library to a phone or tablet to watch offline. The service will also let base package subscribers, who get three simultaneous streams, get unlimited streams on their home wi-fi when they sign up for 4K Plus.
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Since 4K viewing on YouTube TV largely revolved around sports, the service is adding more sports-related features to go along with the new add-on. The service is taking a feature that allows users to jump to various segments within news programs on YouTube TV and bringing it to sports this year. Similar to its key plays view, some events will allow viewers to jump to specific moments while they catch up live or when watching a DVR recording. YouTube TV also wants to make it easy to search for an entire league, a favorite team or to record individual games or tournaments while adding key plays directly to search on mobile.
YouTube TV also said it’s adding 5.1 Dolby audio capabilities for all members, which it said “has been one of your biggest requests.”
“This will start rolling out to select devices over the coming weeks, so you can soon watch movies as if you were in the theater and enhance your watch experience even more with surround-sound audio,” the company wrote in a blog post.