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For English speakers at least, Im fairly confident that the TV in the UK is amongst the best in the world. Even without the huge bonus of no commercial breaks the quality of BBC programmes is hard to match. Now that the BBC has lots of great channels, theres a lot to choose from and its also even easier to watch the great US shows on UK television as even the commercial stations have loads less breaks.

Unfortunately if you are living outside the UK it isnt always easy to get access to UK TV, but heres a few methods in case you want to try.

If you still have a base in the UK then one great option is a little gadget called a slingbox, you can connect this to any satellite box and allow it to relay programs through the internet. Of course you need everything set up in the uk but if you have a fast UK broadband connection and a valid satellite Sky subscription it works really well.

One thing is to remember is that only one channel can be displayed at a time, so if someone is using the setup in the UK you both have to watch the same thing, the next thing to check is that you have a decent upload speed from the UK which helps you stream the video. With those in place you can access all your satellite and cable channels and watch UK TV abroad on your PC. If you dont have a base in the UK then you can even pay people to host a UK satellite system for you, although this can get quite expensive.

But nowadays the most popular and simplest method by far is to watch online using the channels website. The BBC Iplayer website is probably the most extensive and famous of these websites with good reason. But dont forget that all the major UK TV stations such as Sky, Channel 4 and 5 all have similar sites as well. Unfortunately there is a problem here when youre outside the UK called Geotargeting.

Geotargeting is the process of defining what you see based on your IP address, so if youre in the US youll get more American content for instance. This functionality if sometimes quite useful, helping to tailor your web searches to yoru local area for instance, but its also used extensively to block access. All the main UK Channels use this to block access to anyone who has a non-UK IP address unfortunately.

Dont worry though there is another way to bypass this technology online fairly easily. For the BBC Iplayer currently you can just a UK proxy server to surf through. Its fairly easy to do but the challenge is finding a reliable service. You can find free ones that sometimes work, but they constantly disappear, fall over and generally break. If you have lots of time to search each time you want to view something it may be an option for you.

For the other UK stations you need something slightly more than a proxy, you need something called a VPN (a Virtual Private Network) – this is because the other stations media sites block the use of ordinary proxies. Its unlikely youll find a free VPN unless you can set one up yourself. All the main US sites require a VPN as well (a US based one) to access outside the States.

I hope this has given you an insight into how its possible to access UK TV abroad or wherever you are in the world. There are technologies to help you and beat down the barriers of geotargeting online.

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