How to Watch US High School Football Games Live Without Cable in 2024 (2024)

Unlike major college football games that air on local networks or major cable channels, most high school teams do not have a professional camera crew and reporters on location. This means that only the largest schools will be found on local broadcasts while the rest of the high schools operate their own football live streams. This is your guide to figuring out which sports streaming services to watch live sports without cable TV to help you find your favorite high school football team. As a general rule, here’s how you’d find your team:

• Local Networks: CBS, FOX, ABC, & NBC
• Cable Sports Networks: ESPN, FS1, & USA Network
• College Sports Networks: Big Ten Network, SEC Network, ACC Network, etc.
• Streaming Sports Networks: NFHS, beIn Sports, Stadium, and ESPN+

As most teams won’t be broadcasted on TV until the state finals, the best way to watch the regular season is through NFHS Network. It’s a blanket statement, but that’s because NFHS has the most high school teams signed up to their streaming platform to get their games distributed online and through their TV app.

That being said, ESPN is known for the GIECO High School Football Kickoff and the GIECO State Champions Bowl Series. The Kickoff starts in August and usually covers half a dozen games from teams who have the most ESPN 300 players and, in 2023, the GEICO Kickoff will include 54 players bound for Division I college football programs. The Champions Bowl wraps up the season in December and historically streams on ESPNU. Here are the best ways to watch ESPN without cable:

And then there are your local Regional Sports Networks (or RSNs as we call them in the industry). Some kickoff games and state championship games can be found here if the school or fanbase is large enough to justify the broadcasting bill. For example, Texas’s state semifinals were on Bally Sports Southwest and Southern California’s championship games were on SportsNet LA. If you are lucky, all of your team’s games could be broadcasted, like how all of Michigan’s high school football games were on Bally Sports Detroit last year. In some instances, single teams (not complete divisions) are televised on an RSN, such as was the top-ranked team in the nation (St. John Bosco in California) on Bally Sports SoCal. And in other instances, a network may choose to just air select games across the state, as the MSG Network does for New York and New Jersey prep schools.

This is just a sample, though. If you know which sports network your school will be airing on, we have a complete list of regional sports networks. Your high school coach will often know if the team will be airing on an RSN, a live-feed stream, or through the local channel (more on that below).

How to Stream Local High School Football

Since there are over 20,000 high schools in the United States, we’ve stuck to listing out states for each football team. As we pointed out above, NFHS Network has the most schools on its platform and is a good place to look if it isn’t listed below. We’ve broken the US into four regions to help you find your team quickly within the NFHS Network.

In addition to NFHS, some games may be broadcast locally through a local TV affiliate (such as ABC, CBS, FOX, The CW, etc). For example, in Tennessee, the division championships are televised on WMC's NBC 5. If you know your channel’s call sign (like KJZZ in Salt Lake or WAIQ in Central Alabama), you can use our search bar above to find the channel and their respective platforms.

Can You Watch High School Football on DIRECTV STREAM?

DIRECTV STREAM is a live-streaming service that replaces cable or satellite. As long as your team is televised via a regional sports channel or a local channel, there’s a very high likelihood that DIRECTV carries the channel and may be the only streaming platform that does. Unfortunately, NFHS-exclusive games are not broadcasted on DIRECTV as it would probably overrun the platform based on the number of high school games going on at the same time. It’s best to check with your school to find out if the game will be televised or live-streamed.

Similar to DIRECTV STREAM, Fubo is a live-streaming platform that is dedicated to sports. It is a little more expensive than DIRECTV’s cheapest packages but offers a variety of local and national channels that DIRECTV may not have due to specific market channel agreements. NFHS exclusive games, as noted above, will not be on Fubo so you will want to check with your high school to see if the team will be live-streamed or televised with a local broadcaster. When Fubo comes in handy is in the semifinals and championship games; those are often televised along with being live-streamed.

Can You Watch High School Football on YouTube TV?

Despite being a great live-streaming service, YouTube TV doesn’t have any Regional Sports Networks on its platform. That means that if your team is broadcasted on an RSN, YouTube TV is not a good choice for High School football games. Additionally, like other live-streaming platforms, YouTube TV does not have access to NFHS-exclusive games (because those are found on the NFHS platform).

Your school, however, may live stream the game on YouTube or Facebook. This would not be associated with YouTube TV, though.