Hbomax and the new home for TNT Sports: what the switch means for fans watching on phones, sofas, and subscriptions
On a weekday evening in the UK, the small rituals of sport—charging a phone, checking a login, timing dinner around a start time—are about to shift again, as hbomax becomes the new streaming home for TNT Sports from Thursday 26 March. For many viewers, the change is less about branding than about what opens when they tap “sign in, ” what it costs each month, and whether their familiar route to a live race or match still works.
What is changing on Hbomax from Thursday 26 March?
TNT Sports’ streaming service is moving in the UK and Ireland, with HBO Max replacing discovery+ as the streaming home of TNT Sports from Thursday 26 March. All live sport currently shown on discovery+ will move to HBO Max. The change affects online viewing and streaming; on live television, cycling will remain on TNT Sports as before.
Warner Bros. Discovery owns HBO Max, TNT Sports, and discovery+. In the UK and Ireland, HBO Max will bring TNT Sports content together with entertainment programming in one place, including content from HBO, Warner Bros. Pictures, Warner Bros. Television, DC Studios, and Max Originals.
Can existing subscribers keep their access, and how do they sign in?
For viewers already watching TNT Sports through a discovery+ subscription, the transition is designed to be straightforward: existing discovery+ subscribers will still be able to access their current package by signing in to HBOMax. com with the same email address and password. That continuity matters most in everyday moments—when a fan expects a live event to load without a scramble for resets, re-registrations, or missed minutes.
HBO Max will also be available through launch partners Sky and Prime Video, alongside access through hbomax. com. Customers can pre-register Apple Pre-Order and Google Pre-Registration, as part of the platform’s launch approach in the UK and Ireland.
What will it cost, and what options are being offered?
For people paying close attention to price, the announcement centers on subscription structure and a new discounted path. TNT Sports will keep an unchanged price of £30. 99 per month on its monthly plan after the switch. At the same time, customers who want standalone online access to TNT Sports will be able to purchase a 12-month subscription priced at £25. 99 a month—£5 less than the current monthly price—if they take out a 12-month term.
Warner Bros. Discovery describes these as TNT Sports “Saver Plans” with a 12-month term. The company says customers can save between £60 and £131. 88 per year when choosing saver plans, depending on the plan selected. Customers can also buy subscriptions containing all of HBO Max’s services and TNT Sports, or either strand separately.
What live sport moves with the switch, and what are the first cycling events?
The move brings all of TNT Sports’ live and non-live content onto HBO Max in the UK and Ireland. Warner Bros. Discovery says this includes a wide range of sport, such as Premier League football, the Emirates FA Cup, UEFA Champions League football, rugby, tennis including Roland-Garros and the Australian Open, UFC, the World Snooker Tour, MotoGP, and the entire cycling season including the Tour de France, among others.
For cycling fans watching online, the first live bike races shown on HBO Max will be stage four of the men’s Volta a Catalunya and the women’s Ronde van Brugge (formerly the Classic Brugge-De Panne), both taking place on Thursday. The practical detail—what event appears first on a newly preferred app—often becomes the moment that decides whether a transition feels smooth or disruptive.
Why this matters to viewers: a familiar story of switching platforms
The streaming shift arrives in a context of repeated changes for cycling audiences in the UK. The move to HBO Max marks the third time the sport has changed streaming service in the UK in as many years. In late 2023, cycling fans reacted to the closure of GCN+, which had offered live, advert-free racing for £6. 99 a month or £39. 99 a year. Cycling later moved to discovery+ at £6. 99 a month, before being placed within a broader subscription package following the migration from Eurosport to TNT Sports in the UK and Ireland in February 2025—moving the sport behind a £30. 99 a month paywall.
Another long-running viewing habit is also set to change: July will mark the first time in decades that the Tour de France won’t be shown on free-to-air TV in the UK, following ITV’s relinquishing of broadcast rights. In a survey run last year by Cycling Weekly, 71% of respondents said they watched the Tour on ITV. Of 1, 273 people surveyed, 1, 120 said they would not subscribe to TNT Sports to watch the race live in 2026, and almost half said they had never paid to watch cycling on TV. Those figures underscore a tension that sits behind the platform switch: convenience and consolidation for some viewers, cost and access barriers for others.
In the weeks ahead, the new streaming setup will likely be tested not only by marketing promises, but by ordinary use—logins, stream stability, and whether the price options match how people actually watch sport at home. In that sense, hbomax is not just a new app on the screen; it is the next gate in a series of gates that has reshaped where, and how, fans can follow the events they care about.
Image caption (alt text): A fan signs into hbomax on a phone while a live TNT Sports broadcast plays on a TV in the background.
