Where to Watch Free Videos Online

By
Gretchen Siegchrist
Gretchen Siegchrist
Writer
  • New York University
  • Suffolk University
Gretchen Siegchrist is a professional videographer who enjoys helping amateurs master the basics of desktop video.
lifewire's editorial guidelines
Updated on April 27, 2020
Reviewed by
Jon Fisher
Jon Fisher headshot
Reviewed by Jon Fisher
  • Wichita Technical Institute
Jonathan Fisher is a CompTIA certified technologist with more than 6 years' experience writing for publications like TechNorms and Help Desk Geek.
lifewire's editorial guidelines

When you want to watch free videos online you may think immediately of YouTube, which offers an enormous variety of videos, but plenty of other websites offer free videos. You can find them anywhere; you just need to know where to look.

These include professionally produced online videos tailored to specific audiences, user-generated video clips, and web broadcasts of TV shows and movies. You may need to enter an email address to open an account at a website, but you should beware of any site that asks for your credit card information.

Watch Free TV Online

Illustration of a young man sitting at a laptop wearing Beats-type headphones and laughing
Ashley Nicole DeLeon / Lifewire

Many new and older TV programs are available online through network websites or video aggregators. 

  • Crackle provides free streaming movies, TV series, and original programming for all your devices. Search by genre or title, or select one of the videos highlighted daily. The high-quality content can be paused and restarted on your other devices or queued for future watching.
  • ShareTV offers thousands of TV shows (retro and current) and movies available for free streaming to your computer or mobile device and includes shows from an extensive list of networks all over the world, including the popular networks in the United States.
  • Cartoon HD. ​Despite its name, Cartoon HD isn't limited to cartoons. Use the site to watch unlimited TV shows and full movies online for free. This site doesn't host the shows; it crawls the web for available online videos, TV shows, and movies. You need to know how to download and install APK files to use this site.

Watch Free Educational Videos Online

You can watch free videos online from educational networks like National Geographic. Other websites, like the Annenberg Foundation, offer educational videos produced specifically for the Web.

  • The PBS website hosts a collection of educational videos that you can watch free online. These shows appeared originally on public broadcasting and cover a wide range of educational topics.
  • TED offers a fascinating collection of free video talks from the world's leading thinkers and doers.

Other Video Sharing Websites

Some video sharing websites offer user-generated content along with professionally produced videos. 

  • Vimeo is a video sharing website with short-form and long-form videos in a wide range of areas, including comedy, documentary, music, sports, animation, instructional, and many more. The site offers a free account along with paid ones.
  • DailyMotion is a video-sharing website packed with random video commentary from funny to serious. Although not as well known as YouTube, it is one of the largest video sites in the world. 

Watch Free Music Videos Online

  • Watch free music videos online at websites that cater to all musical tastes. MTV is the granddaddy of music video outlets and is still at it. Check out this site for free videos of popular recording artists.
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