The Los Angeles Lakers continue their Eastern Conference swing with a matchup at home against the Philadelphia 76ers today. Both teams are in the midst of a fight to avoid the play-in tournament in their respective conferences, making this a relatively important game for late-March.
Tip-off is scheduled for very soon, 10:30 p.m. ET, and will be televised on NBC Sports Philadelphia (in 76ers markets only), Spectrum SportsNet (Lakers markets) and NBA TV (everywhere). If you don’t have any of those channels, there are also plenty of ways you can watch a live stream of the game for free or cheap.
We’ll start with Sling TV. It’s not free–as in, it doesn’t offer a free trial–but it is certainly cheap.
If you go with the “Sling Orange” channel plan and the “Sports Extra” add-on, not only will you get NBA TV for this game, but you’ll get ESPN, ESPN2, ESPN3 (which simulcasts ABC game), ESPNU, TNT and TBS for a smattering of NBA games and both the men’s and women’s college basketball tournaments. All of that will run you just $26 for your first month–which covers both NCAA tourneys–and then $51 per month after that, which is still well cheaper than any other live-TV streaming service with these channels.
You can also get Paramount+ With SHOWTIME, Starz, AMC+ and MGM+ all free for your first month–with no commitment to keep them longer than the free month.
There are four different ways you can watch a live stream of the Lakers vs 76ers for free: Fubo, DirecTV Stream, YouTube TV or the NBA TV Amazon Prime Channel. Here’s a quick breakdown of each:
DirecTV Stream: The “Choice” channel plan or above will get you NBA TV, as well as both NBC Sports Philadelphia and Spectrum SportsNet in local markets. This is the only streaming service that includes Spectrum SportsNet. It comes with a free five-day trial.
Fubo: The regular “Pro” channel package includes NBC Sports Philadelphia for those in the 76ers market, while the “Sports Plus with NFL RedZone” add-on has NBA TV. Both of those can be included in your seven-day free trial.
YouTube TV: Both NBA TV and NBC Sports Philadelphia are in the “Base Plan,” which comes with a five-day trial. You can also watch a free preview for 20 minutes before signing up.
Amazon Prime Channels: Amazon Prime subscribers (Prime comes with a 30-day free trial) can watch a live stream of NBA TV via Prime Channels. It’s only $7 per month, but it also comes with a seven-day free trial if you want to watch tonight’s game without paying anything.
We recommend NordVPN if you’re trying to access any of those aforementioned streaming services from somewhere outside of the United States. You’ll get the ol’ access denied message if you try to watch from abroad, but NordVPN can hide your location and connect you to a US-based server (it has over 2,000 alone in the US) in order to bypass these restrictions.
Though it doesn’t come with a free trial, NordVPN does offer a 30-day money-back guarantee to let you try it out completely risk-free.
is our recommendation due to its reliability, speed and massive number of servers (you can also connect to a server in a different state to get around any potential local blackouts). But if you want to shop around, you can take a look at our guide to the best VPN services available right now.
Some of the best shots in Grok Imagine’s AI-made Odyssey don’t contain actors. Ancient landscapes stretch into the distance. Close-ups of grimy hands suggest people who have touched something rougher than a keyboard. For a few seconds, the illusion holds.
https://twitter.com/imagine/status/2113712964419063911
YouTube videos could soon look better without eating quite so much data, right? Thankfully, the platform plans to introduce a new video format called AV2 on its web player in early 2027, promising more efficient streaming and potentially fewer playback hiccups on slower internet connections. The big headline is a roughly 30% improvement in compression efficiency over AV1, YouTube's existing video format. That doesn't guarantee every video will use 30% less data, but it could make streaming a little easier on both internet connections and data allowances.
What is AV2, and why should viewers care?
YouTube is changing how its Home page works, giving viewers more control over what shows up there and making some of the app’s most-used sections easier to reach. Custom Feeds are now replacing the existing topic chips for eligible users, while YouTube is also testing a redesigned top bar on mobile that moves Subscriptions closer to the Home feed.
YouTube first started experimenting with Custom Feeds earlier this year, letting you type out what you wanted to watch and turning that request into its own stream of recommendations. Now, the feature is starting to look less like a side experiment and more like something YouTube actually wants people to use as part of their everyday Home page.