check current rate
Advanced options
The rule in one line: you need a licence to watch or record LIVE TV on any channel or service (ITV, Sky, sport on Amazon: live is live), or to use BBC iPlayer at all: you don't need one for pure on-demand streaming (Netflix, Disney+, catch-up that isn't iPlayer, YouTube). Concessions: free over-75s on Pension Credit, 50% blind concession, ~GBP 7.50 for residential care. Cancelling when eligible requires actually being eligible: enforcement letters are famously persistent either way.
What The TV Licence Calculator Works Out
- Do you need one: the legal test is liveness and iPlayer, not the BBC. A licence is required to watch or record live television on any channel or service (ITV, Sky, live sport on Amazon) and to use BBC iPlayer at all; pure on-demand streaming on Netflix, Disney+, non-iPlayer catch-up and YouTube needs none.
- Cost per viewing hour: the licence fee divided by your weekly live or iPlayer hours x 52, in pence. Ten hours a week puts the fee at about 33p an hour, streaming-subscription territory for a heavy viewer and poor value for a household whose aerial was disconnected years ago.
- Ways to pay less: direct debit spreads the cost without discounting it; the over-75 free licence now depends on Pension Credit, one of the lowest take-up benefits; and the honest annual audit either saves the whole fee or confirms it, since liveness is binary in law however occasional in habit.
- Concession (advanced): the blind or severely sight impaired concession halves the fee, the Accommodation for Residential Care licence costs GBP 7.50 a year, and over-75s receiving Pension Credit pay nothing. The per-hour and per-person cards use the concessionary price.
- How you pay (advanced): monthly direct debit costs the same as paying annually; quarterly direct debit adds GBP 1.25 to each payment, GBP 5 a year, the only payment method that costs more.
- People in the household (advanced): one licence covers everyone at the address, so the per-person-per-month card shows what the fee works out at for each viewer.
- Streaming cost per hour (advanced): your combined subscriptions x 12 divided by your streaming hours x 52, so the licence and the streaming stack are compared on the same per-hour basis instead of as headline prices.
- Per hour including radio (advanced): the fee also funds the BBC radio networks, Sounds, the website and the archive, which per-hour TV arithmetic ignores. Adding radio hours shows the fuller picture.
- No Licence Needed declaration: if you genuinely need no licence, filing the declaration quiets most of the enforcement correspondence. It only works if you are actually eligible.