If you’ve decided to cut the cord once and for all, you’ve probably noticed there that are dozens of sports streaming services to choose from. However, not all of these have an official Kodi addon, which makes it hard to get all of your favorite content in one place.
Addons like the now-defunct SportsAccess and its more modern cousins, SportHD, The Crew, and Rising Tides, claim to offer the solution, with every kind of content imaginable, free-of-charge. The problem is that these are piracy addons, which have been a blight on Kodi since the app’s creation, and led to significant negative press.
There are legitimate alternatives out there, though! These will ensure you always get the highest-quality live streams, and that you won’t have to worry about any legal issues. Below, we’ll reveal some of the best alternatives to the SportsAccess Kodi addon so you can watch all of your favorite sports safely.
Warning: Kodi should only be used for content to which you have the legal right to access. Neither the Kodi Foundation nor Comparitech advocates the use of Kodi for piracy.
Always use a VPN with Kodi
Some Kodi addons gather content from unlicensed sources. However, even if you only watch official streams, you should still consider using a Virtual Private Network (VPN). These encrypt your internet traffic, protecting you from Man-in-the-Middle attacks and service provider throttling, while ensuring you can continue to use region-specific streaming services while abroad on vacation.
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What was SportsAccess?
SportsAccess doesn’t exist anymore but for a long time, it was one of the most popular illicit sports streaming services. Like its recently shut-down competitor, Smoothstreams, SportsAccess was a pirate IPTV service that charged users a small monthly fee for access to premium live streams. As you might expect, the Kodi addon allowed subscribers to view these via Kodi.
The important thing to remember is that just because a service costs money, that doesn’t mean it’s legal. To make matters worse, SportsAccess had virtually no customer support and a poor grasp of the technical aspect of providing IPTV services (links would frequently redirect to 404 pages and the site was known to crash consistently). Finally, SportsAccess only accepted payment in Bitcoin, so once you’ve paid, that money is effectively never coming back, even if the service is broken.
Best alternatives to SportsAccess
It’s not easy to list one specific alternative to SportsAccess since that’ll depend on where you live, which sports you’re interested in, and whether you have a cable TV subscription or not. Still, here are a few of the best Kodi addons for sport to give you an idea of what’s available:
ESPN
This addon offers access to ESPN’s wide array of sports. Once you’ve signed in with your cable provider details or an ESPN+ account. The ESPN Kodi addon works with version 18 (Leia) and 19 (Matrix), and lets you stream (among other things):
- Soccer
- Tennis
- Football
- Baseball
- Basketball
- Ice Hockey
- Golf
The ESPN addon can be found in the SlyGuy repository.
CBC Sports (Canada only)
CBC Sports is one of Canada’s biggest sports channels, and its content is available, free of charge online. This is the kind of thing Kodi was made for, so it’s only natural that an addon would come along eventually.
Users can stream matches live or on-demand, and the amount of content is truly staggering. There’s everything from beach volleyball to figure skating, so you shouldn’t have any issues finding something to watch. Note that while you don’t have to sign in, you will have to be in Canada (or connected to a Canadian VPN server) before you can stream full events.
The CBC Sports addon is included in the official Kodi repository.
iPlayer WWW (UK only)
This isn’t exclusively a sports addon, but as the BBC is Britain’s largest broadcaster, it does show a huge number of events, including Rugby Union, the FIFA World Cup, and Bellator MMA. BBC iPlayer, the network’s streaming service, is free to use, but requires you to first create an account. These credentials can then be entered into the iPlayer WWW addon to watch via Kodi.
Note that you’ll also need a valid TV license to access BBC iPlayer’s content, regardless of whether it’s live or on-demand. The iPlayer WWW addon can be found in the official Kodi repo.
Kayo Sports (Australia only)
Kayo Sports is an up-and-coming Australian streaming service that’s particularly popular with cord-cutters. Part of the reason for this is that it’s reasonably priced, with plans starting at $25 AUD per month, but it’s also one of the only ways to stream ESPN without cable.
All of the main sports you’d expect are covered, but there are also some more niche events, like World Axe Throwing League, Australian Touch Football, and Women’s Rugby. If you create an account, you’ll be able to watch certain events for free each week, even if your subscription has lapsed.
You’ll find Kayo in the SlyGuy repo.
Honorable mentions
The official Kodi repo is home to a ton of great sports addons, including all of those listed below:
- MLB.TV
- NBC Sports Live Extra
- NFL Game Pass
- NHL TV
- Red Bull TV
- Sky Video Italia (Italy only)
- Sportschau (Germany only)
Streaming sports on Kodi: FAQs
Are SportHD, Rising Tides, and The Crew legal?
While you’ll frequently see these addons recommended elsewhere, they rely on unofficial sources and don’t require users to log in before watching anything. As such, they are not legal to use and will almost certainly be shut down at some point, just like Smoothstreams, SportsAccess, and Northern IP TV were before them.
Here’s the thing: these addons provide a poor experience at best. You’ll often find that their streams take forever to load, can’t find any sources, or play videos that are completely different from what was expected. Further, most well-known piracy addons eventually stop working one day, forcing users to continuously risk their system’s health installing the next big addon from a sketchy repo that no one has ever heard of.
How can I tell if I'm using a legitimate Kodi addon?
The easiest way to tell if your Kodi addon is legitimate is to ask two questions: “Have I heard of this service before?” and “Do I have to login or be in a specific country to use it?”. If both things are true, it’s likely safe to use.
Conversely, here are a few red flags to look out for:
- The service has an unprofessional-looking website
- Customer service is done primarily over social media, if at all
- Only Bitcoin payments are accepted, or no payment is required despite users being able to watch live sports, newly-released movies, and so on
- Googling the service leads to posts where people are unsure if it is legitimate
- The addon is hard to find, and may only available from a little known repo
Can I watch other kinds of content on Kodi?
With Kodi, the possibilities are near endless. As long as you have the right addons, you’ll be able to stream movies, anime, live TV, cartoons, and more.
To make things even easier, Kodi works with just about every major operating system. In other words, you can watch on PCs, Mac, smartphones, Amazon Fire TV, NVidia Shield, Apple TV, and even Roku.
Why would anyone “cut the cord” when looking at the prices for the above sports packages?
The point of cutting the cord is to save money, no? When you factor in the cost of your internet pipe, combined with the cost of the above packages, it doesn’t make any sense to leave your cable or satellite package.
You would be better off calling your cable or satellite provider and telling them their packages are too expensive and you wish to part ways. By doing so, they will transfer you over to “retentions” and offer you a much more attractive package, usually for less cost.