PGA Tour Live is moving for 2019 and beyond. In a new partnership with NBC Sports starting next year, PGA Tour Live will be available in the United States through the NBC Sports Gold over-the-top streaming service as a separate add-on.
Effectively, PGA Tour Live will be available in the United States only through the NBC Sports Gold platform. By purchasing PGA Tour Live through NBC Sports Gold, fans will be able to watch PGA Tour Live, as well Golf Channel and NBC Sports PGA Tour coverage in one place. That's a smart way to potentially head off younger golf fans who are ditching cable because of the overall expense and giving them access to most PGA Tour events. PGA Tour Live will now become available on more platforms, however, with the addition of Amazon Fire TV, Roku and Chromecast. This also means ESPN+ subscribers will lose access to PGA Tour Live as part of their monthly subscription starting in 2019.
While 2019 pricing is still to be announced, the amount of coverage will increase in 2019, going up to 360 total hours for subscribers and hundreds more hours free to all from 28 different PGA Tour events, beginning with the CareerBuilder Challenge in January and going through the Tour Championship in August.
For the PGA Tour, this means moving their video distribution platform to NBC Sports' Playmaker Media, and it also means NBC Sports and Golf Channel will promote the product more frequently on-air. While we don't know how long this deal lasts, and rumors persist about the PGA Tour's intentions to bring all of its production in-house following the expiration of TV deals in 2021, this sets up continuity between the PGA Tour and its biggest domestic TV partner.
