Watch Euro 2016 Live Online With Le VPN
We first published this guide for Euro 2016 in France — the tournament of Iceland’s thunderclap, Wales reaching the semi-finals and Portugal lifting the trophy in Paris. The teams change every four years, but one thing has stayed exactly the same through every edition of the UEFA European Championship since: the streams are geo-blocked, and fans abroad get locked out of the coverage they want.
The good news is that the fix has stayed the same too. Whichever Euros you are reading this before, a VPN lets you watch every match live online from anywhere in the world. Here is how it works.
Why you can't stream the Euros from abroad
UEFA sells European Championship broadcasting rights country by country. In the UK, the BBC and ITV traditionally share the matches free-to-air, streaming on BBC iPlayer and ITVX. France, Germany, Spain, Italy and every other market have their own national broadcasters, many of them also free-to-air. The US and other non-European markets have their own rights holders again.
Each of those services checks your IP address before playing video. If your connection appears to come from outside the licensed country, you are blocked. That leaves three groups stranded every tournament:
- Travellers whose home streaming apps stop working the moment they cross a border — often right in the middle of the group stage.
- Expats stuck with local coverage in a language they don't speak, when their home broadcaster is showing the same match with the commentary they grew up on.
- Fans outside Europe whose local options are limited, expensive or nonexistent — while European broadcasters stream the whole tournament for free.
How Le VPN unblocks every match
A VPN (virtual private network) routes your internet traffic through an encrypted tunnel to a server in a country you choose. Streaming services see the VPN server’s IP address instead of yours, so you appear to be in that country. Want the BBC’s coverage? Connect to a UK server and BBC iPlayer treats you as a British viewer — BBC and ITV streams are confirmed to work with any of Le VPN’s UK servers. Prefer French, German or Spanish commentary? Pick the matching country instead.
Le VPN offers servers in 100+ locations across the Americas, Europe, the Middle East, Asia-Pacific and Africa — covering every Euros broadcast market. See the full server list.
Setup takes minutes:
- Subscribe on the Le VPN plans page — your first purchase comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee.
- Install the apps for Windows, macOS, iOS or Android. One account allows up to 5 simultaneous connections, so the whole household is covered for simultaneous kick-offs.
- Connect to the country whose broadcaster you want to watch.
- Verify your location on the IP test page.
- Open the broadcaster's site or app and watch live — or catch up with replays and highlights after the final whistle.
Make the most of a month of football
Choose a fast protocol. Le VPN supports OpenVPN, WireGuard, Stealth WireGuard and IPSec/IKEv2. WireGuard is generally the quickest and most stable for HD live sport. Stealth WireGuard adds obfuscation for countries and networks that block VPN traffic itself.
Beat the time zones. Euros kick-offs are built around European evenings. Watching from the Americas or Asia-Pacific, you can either take the afternoon/overnight matches live or use the same VPN connection to stream your broadcaster's full replays at a civilised hour.
Switch servers on big match nights. If a stream buffers during a knockout game, hop to another server in the same country — Le VPN has multiple UK locations, among others.
More than football: security while you travel
A VPN earns its keep beyond match days. The same encrypted tunnel that changes your virtual location also hides your online activity from whoever runs the network you’re on — which matters when you’re streaming a quarter-final over hotel or airport Wi-Fi. Your logins, payment details and browsing stay private, whether you’re at home or following the tournament from a beach bar three countries away.
The European Championship delivers a month of drama every four years — shock group-stage exits, penalty shootouts and the occasional fairy-tale run. Sign up to Le VPN today and watch every minute of the Euros live online, wherever the summer takes you.
