Amazon's exclusive Thursday Night Football games are headed to thousands of bars and restaurants across the country.
Prime Video has entered into a multi-year agreement with DirecTV to bring its Thursday Night Football games to 300,000 "sports bars, restaurants, hotel lounges, retail shops and services" nationwide this season.
The deal comes after Amazon in 2021 reached an agreement with the NFL to offer 15 exclusive Thursday Night Football games and a pre-season game on Prime Video each year, becoming the first streaming service to secure such a deal with the league. It was originally expected to begin in 2023, but the deal was later moved up to 2022. But when the agreement was announced, it wasn't immediately clear how this might affect fans' ability to watch Thursday Night Football in sports bars.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Now, DirecTV for Business says it will offer the Prime Video games to national chains, some of which have more than 1,000 locations, as well as "your favorite local pub just down the street," and the pregame, halftime, and postgame coverage will also be made available.
The deal will begin with an August 25 preseason game between the San Francisco 49ers at the Houston Texans, and it will include all the regular season games beginning Sept. 15, according to a press release. Terms of the agreement weren't disclosed.
Continue reading for free
We hope you're enjoying The Week's refreshingly open-minded journalism.
Subscribed to The Week? Register your account with the same email as your subscription.