International TV in Spain

One of the first things that you find when you move abroad is just how cut off you suddenly feel.  This is especially true until you start to pick up the language to be able to communicate and understand the locals.  This feeling of isolation can be relieved by adding an English TV package.  This will immediately give you the feeling of contact with the outside world (even if it is divorced slightly from you own location).  TV also seems to have a remarkable effect on getting children into a routine, and helping them to settle especially in the first few weeks.

Officially it is not legal to subscribe to Sky from abroad because SKY doesn't own the broadcast rights for the rest of Europe but you can get round this especially if you still have a bank account and address in the UK.

So you want to receive English channels directly from the UK while you are living in Spain? Well it is not so difficult, first if you already have a subscription for Sky in the UK you can still bring it back to France with you, the only detail is depending where you live in SPAIN the dish size you use.  In the UK dishes are typically between 60cm for Astra 2d spot where the main freesat channels are broadcast.  In Spain  you need between 120 cm and 380 cm from North to South of the country, including the Canary islands.  You have probably seen the huge satellite dishes on the roofs on the Irish or British pubs to receive Sky sports (More than 4 meters).  Officially it is not legal to subscribe to Sky from abroad because SKY doesn't own the broadcast rights for the rest of Europe but you can get round this especially if you still have a bank account and address in the UK. Alternatively if you do not want to (or cannot) subscribe to SKY, you also have the option of free view.  For this you need a digital sat receiver, if you get one for HD MPEG4 this will allow you to watch BBC HD and Channel 4 HD and other channels to come.

Prices starting from 65 Euro plus a satellite dish and if you can't install it yourself, check our database to find a retailer near where you live.

With free view, you will get most of main channels like, BBC, ITV, Channel 4, Channel 5 (new) and about 100 other channels which are in the clear on Astra 2 you do need to check the size of your dish depending where you are located.

This the map than ASTRA OPERATOR provides to check the size of the dish needed. In Spain you can receive the TNT, digital terrestrial television for free, about 20 channels all in Spanish. There is a digital platform via satellite, DIGITAL PLUS (Spanish Canal plus) with multilingual option where the program or the film  is not originally in Spanish. Check for information THE WEBSITE OF DIGITAL PLUS : WWW.PLUS.ES (In Spanish)