All products and services featured are independently chosen by editors. However, Billboard may receive a commission on orders placed through its retail links, and the retailer may receive certain auditable data for accounting purposes.
Actor Finn Wolfhard is hosting Saturday Night Live this week. The Stranger Things star opens 2026 as host for the first time on Saturday, Jan. 17. The variety show also has iconic musical guest on the booking with A$AP Rocky. SNL airs on NBC at 11:30 p.m. ET/PT.
This is the first episode of the new year, as the cast is down one “Not Ready for Prime Time” player with Bowen Yang exiting the show after seven seasons. Yang left the show after the Dec. 20 episode with host Ariana Grande and musical guest Cher.
Want to watch SNL online without cable and for free? Your easiest bet is to grab a free trial to DirecTV or FuboTV to stream an NBC live feed online without needing a subscription.
Keep reading to learn all the other streaming options to watch SNL online without cable.
How to Stream ‘Saturday Night Live’ for Free
In order to watch SNL, you’ll need to have access to NBC. If you have cable, then you just need to look up what channel NBC is on, which you can find it in your channel guide through your cable provider. Don’t have cable? There are a few ways to watch Saturday Night Live online for free.
A subscription to DirecTV — which comes with NBC for SNL — gets you access to live TV, local and cable channels, starting at $39.99 per month for the MyNews package. The service even offers a five-day free trial to watch for free, if you sign up now.
You can watch local networks such as CBS, ABC and FOX, while you can also watch many cable news networks, including CNN, FOX News, C-Span, MS Now and others.
A subscription to Sling Blue, which comes with NBC for SNL, gets you access to live TV, local and cable channels.
You can watch local networks such as ABC and FOX (in select markets), while you can watch many cable networks, including Bravo, Cartoon Network, Discovery Channel, E!, Fox Sports, FX, Fox News, MSNBC, National Geographic, SYFY, TLC, USA Network, A&E, AMC, BBC America, BET, CNN, Comedy Central, Food Network, Fuse, HGTV, History Channel, IFC, Lifetime, Nick Jr., QVC, TBS, TNT, Travel Channel, Vice and many others.
Please note: Prices and channel availability depends on your local TV market. You can learn more about Sling TV here.
Starting at $48.99 for the first month of service ($73.99 per month afterwards), FuboTV offers a five-day free trial when you sign up for one of its plans. You’ll gain access to more than 200 live TV channels — including NBC — so you can watch SNL for free. After your free trial is over you’ll be charged the subscription price based on the plan you choose or you can cancel at anytime.
Another great option is to subscribe to Peacock, which is the official NBC streamer. The Peacock Premium Plus plan ($16.99 per month) gives you access to the NBC channel, which means you can watch SNL live. There is no free trial for the streaming platform, but if you want to watch the episode on-demand, Peacock does comes with an ad-supported plan that’s only $10.99 per month month and you’ll have access to new episodes of SNL the day after it airs.
You can also expand your streaming library through Hulu + Live TV, which gives you access to the entire Hulu, Disney+ and ESPN Unlimited libraries on top of hundreds of live TV channels, like NBC.
In the meantime, watch a promo reel for tonight’s episode below:
Want more? For more product recommendations, check out our roundups of the best Xbox deals, studio headphones and Nintendo Switch accessories.