Delay when watching sport on sky stream

[HumeWatson]

I have noticed there is a "Live sync" option on Sky Sports Main Event which is great, however if England are playing (football) then it is on ITV/BBC and there is always a delay. Is there any way to get "Live Sync" on other channels apart from just Sky Sports Main Event? Really frustrating when your paying the luxury price to have sky.

Sky Stream User

[SKY1992bf]

@HumeWatson  Not currently 

[Jason+Golding]

Technically there will always be some lag when watching via streaming. That's life 

[MarkGoldsmith]

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@HumeWatson wrote:

I have noticed there is a "Live sync" option on Sky Sports Main Event which is great, however if England are playing (football) then it is on ITV/BBC and there is always a delay. Is there any way to get "Live Sync" on other channels apart from just Sky Sports Main Event? Really frustrating when your paying the luxury price to have sky.

Sky Stream User

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Typically that would require the other broadcasters like BBC and ItV to invest in the technology to improve the latency on the streams they are providing Sky. 

As we can see with Sky Sports Main Event Sky have been slowly rolling and testing this technology out with the aim to roll out to all their sports channels at some point in the not too distant future.

[Nigelb1972]

Any live sporting event that broadcast by any method will have a delay. The only way to experience no delays is to be at the event in person. 

Broadcast delays are typically less than 30 seconds on Stream but with the system Sky are trailing, this should drop to around 10 seconds bringing it close to satellite or Multicast IP delivery.

[fgdfgdfg]

Is "Live sync" actually syncing with live or is there still a delay even on the low latency channel?    Are there actually plans to roll this out to other channels ever?    It was introduced August 2024 so like 8 months ago, and so far it's just one channel.

Sky are pushing up SkyQ prices aggressively, clearly to phase it out and replace it with Sky Stream, but until the delays are sorted it's simply not fit for purpose...

[fgdfgdfg]

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As we can see with Sky Sports Main Event Sky have been slowly rolling and testing this technology out with the aim to roll out to all their sports channels at some point in the not too distant future.

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How distant would you say?

[AndrewF_UK]

Only Sky can say that. But there's a lot of really good work happening in this space. BBC R&D believes they've found ways to make streaming as good as or even better than traditional broadcast delay. Once that kind of technology is ready for prime time it's feasible that it will actually be normal TV that's behind streaming!

I suspect live sync has some similar tech, but note that BBC blog which says if it was enabled universally some people would experience a worse experience. So that is probably why it's an opt-in and limited experience at the moment. 

[fgdfgdfg]

Thanks.  How much of a delay would you currently say the low latency channel is?

[AndrewF_UK]

From the event happening in the stadium I believe it's meant to be around 8 seconds to you seeing it on your TV which is comparable to Satellite TV.

[fgdfgdfg]

I meant Sky Stream low latency compared to SkyQ?

Respectly I disagree with your point about 8 seconds.  I've been to see the F1 live in the past and speaking on the phone to someone at home with SkyQ the delay between real life and SkyQ was roughly 1-2 seconds.

Ultimately Sky Stream is still not fit for purpose if it's 8 seconds delayed vs SkyQ, certainly not for those that follow online scores, F1 data telemetary and chat in whatsapp groups.

[AndrewF_UK]

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@fgdfgdfg wrote:

I meant Sky Stream low latency compared to SkyQ?

Respectly I disagree with your point about 8 seconds.  I've been to see the F1 live in the past and speaking on the phone to someone at home with SkyQ the delay between real life and SkyQ was roughly 1-2 seconds.

Ultimately Sky Stream is still not fit for purpose if it's 8 seconds delayed vs SkyQ, certainly not for those that follow online scores, F1 data telemetary and chat in whatsapp groups.

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Yes I think Satellite is roughly 2s behind the live action but can fluctuate to more than that. To me, a 6s difference is negligible and acceptable which is why I describe it as comparable but I appreciate why that's not acceptable for you. 

Ultimately, right now if that's a red line for you then no it's not a suitable product for you.