Free, ad-supported streaming services are one of the fastest-growing areas in cable TV. FOX owns Tubi, Paramount owns Pluto TV, NBC Universal has Xumo Play, and Warner Bros. Discovery will launch a service called WBTV at some point in the future. Those are just the free services owned by a major TV company. There are probably hundreds of free, legal streaming services.

Last year, Disney quietly began building a free streaming service using its ABC app. Without much fanfare and no announcement that we could find, in early 2023 Disney began dramatically increasing the number of free live channels of Disney-owned content on the ABC app. This includes 24/7 feeds of popular older ABC shows and content from other networks like National Geographic. Most notably, Disney just recently added a free feed of ESPN with ESPN8.

Since the beginning of 2024, Disney has expanded its free streaming service to 23 channels, plus many more channels that you can unlock if you have a paid TV service.

This is how Disney describes its new free streaming service:

How about instant access to 24/7 streaming channels with great shows, movies and specials that ALWAYS ON? We’re talking all-day entertainment with no sign-up required thanks to our growing selection of unlocked channels, which now includes the brand new live streaming channels 20/20 and ESPN8: The Ocho. Watch for free with no sign-up required! Be sure to check out the ABC app from your smartphone and tablet (iOS And Android), computers on ABC.com and connected devices (Roku, AppleTV and Amazon Fire TV). Check out our list of unlocked channels below and start streaming now!

Free streaming services like Pluto TV, Tubi, and others are a multi-billion dollar business that is expected to continue to grow. Now Disney seems to want a piece of that pie to not only make money but also grow its paid Disney+ service.

Paramount is one of the most successful providers of using free streaming services to promote paid services. Paramount uses Pluto TV to promote the Paramount+ subscription. This is done by often showing older seasons of Paramount+ shows on Pluto TV just before a new season comes out. Paramount hopes that viewers will fall in love with the free show on Pluto TV and subscribe to watch the new season on Paramount+.

Disney is currently a long way from competing against Pluto TV and Tubi with its ABC app, but they have slowly built up the amount of free content streaming live 24/7 on the service’s channels. The question now is, will this test of free TV via ABC evolve into a full-scale attempt to directly take on the large but extremely competitive field of free streaming services like Pluto TV and Tubi?

You can watch these free channels on the ABC Roku Channel by adding it to your Roku HERE.