In my house, we watch a lot of movies. When I say a lot, I mean a lot. In addition to our premium movie channels that we subscribe to from DirecTV, we also subscribe to Netflix streaming and Hulu+, but we also have access to Amazon Prime Streaming and Crackle as well. Searching for movies that we want to watch across all of these various streaming services can be a bit of a challenge.
I read about Can I Stream It? on TechCrunch back in November but I didn’t begin to seriously use the movie search engine until their Android app became available earlier this year. Since installing it, searching for movies across different subscription and free services that we use has never been easier.
Gizmodo called Can I Stream It? the Kayak of streaming movie results, and that’s really pretty accurate as Can I Stream It? is a metasearch engine for streaming movies. While it might not be as inclusive as I’d like for it to be, it is a very useful app to have if you’re searching for a movie to watch.
Take a look at the search results categories:
Service | Streaming | Rental | Purchase | DVD-Blu-Ray |
| Netflix | X | X | ||
| Amazon | X | X | X | X |
| Hulu | X | |||
| Crackle | X | |||
| YouTube | X | X | ||
| Epix | X | |||
| iTunes | X | X | ||
| Google Play | X | |||
| Vudu | X | X | ||
| Blockbuster | X | X | X | |
| Redbox | X |
You’ll notice that Can I Stream It? breaks streaming and rentals out into different categories in your search results, so you’ll see results for the all-you-can-watch services separately from the pay-per-title options. There’s also no results for premium streaming services like HBO Go and MAX Go, but the content provided by HBO is pretty predictable based on their monthly TV service.
Also, Can I Stream It? omits results for Blockbuster streaming, as well as DVD and Blu-ray results. I’m not certain why, but between the Blockbuster At Home for Dish subscribers and all of their old fashioned brick and mortar stores it seems like a huge miss, but those results are not included.
Can I Stream It? also doesn’t search for TV shows at this, even though their website has said that TV results are coming soon for months. I like to watch TV series that I’ve never started, or to go back and finish off a series that I gave up on, but CISI isn’t useful for these results.
There are some similar websites like Watchily and TV and Movies Now that both offer a similar type of service that includes TV results, but neither offers an Android app at this time. I also prefer the results page for CISI over both of the other options.
Can I Stream It? is a free, ad supported app available in the Google Play Store for phones running ICS and below, but my 7″ and 10″ tablets are not supported.