On Thursday, T-Mobile announced a number of new services available for Binge On. Those that might be unaware of what Binge On is, it’s essentially a service that will “optimize” data traffic from certain sources and that data won’t count against your cap. Many of the bigger players had already been on board, like Netflix, Hulu, HBO Go and many others. T-Mobile’s own John Legere had stated that some of their partners had seen huge growth in customers using their service, compared to before Binge On. And today they are adding Baeble Music, Discovery Go, ESNE TV, FilmOn.TV, Fox Business, Google Play Movies & TV, KlowdTV, Red Bull TV and YouTube. Now obviously the Google Play Movies & TV as well as YouTube are the big names here. Especially considering the argument that Legere and YouTube were having just a few months ago regarding BingeOn.
Partners can apply to have their service part of Binge On, so this isn’t a case of T-Mobile just adding who ever, these are companies that want to be in Binge On. YouTube wasn’t too happy with T-Mobile’s Binge On service for a while, stating that it would decrease the quality of their content and also giving customers a not so great experience on YouTube. However it looks like the two have made up, and T-Mobile has made a few changes to Binge On since it launched. Which has made things much better.
Also included in today’s announcement is a new feature for their data partners – and likely why YouTube opted to join Binge On. Video providers can opt out of their content being shown at a lower quality. So they can opt to stream at their native resolutions, and that even includes 4K Ultra HD. What this means is that now, not all of the video data on T-Mobile’s network will be “optimized” or throttled. Making it a good thing for users and providers.
So now you can watch video on these providers, there’s over 50 of them, without it hitting your data cap. Those that wish to opt out of Binge On, you will still get somewhat optimized video from any video service out there – even those not on Binge On. T-Mobile says that will make your data go up to 3 times as far as it normally would. Meaning you can watch more video than ever before, without having to worry about your data cap. Good news for everyone there. To use Binge On, you do need to be on a plan of at least 3GB, similar to what you need to get Data Stash as well. You can check out T-Mobile’s website for more details.