Prime Video, the OTT streaming heavyweight owned by e-commerce giant Amazon, has agreed a carriage deal with French club soccer governing body, the LFP, to host its Ligue 1 Plus in-house direct-to-consumer (DTC) service.
The service will launch on Prime Video on August 11 with a discounted introductory rate of €12.99 ($15.12) per month for a full-year subscription, which will be offered through August 31.
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Perhaps uniquely, a Prime Video subscription will not be required to access the channel.
Speaking on the carriage deal, Prime Video director for international sports Alex Green commented: “We know there are many Prime members in France who are fans of Ligue 1 and trust us to deliver a great experience at an unbeatable price.”
Prime Video joins telecom and TV heavyweights Bouygues Telecom, Free, Orange, and SFR, as well as the DAZN OTT service, as hosts of the DTC offering.
The new channel will domestically cover eight of the nine Ligue 1 games per matchday exclusively from the start of the upcoming 2025-26 Ligue 1 season on August 15, with the ninth match (a BeIN live exclusive game) will be broadcast delayed.
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By GlobalDataThis will be supported by two magazine shows and other ancillary content and shoulder programming produced by Mediawan.
Subscriptions can initially be bought for €14.99 ($17.66) per month for an annual subscription, or a non-committal monthly tier at $19.99 per month, both of which are well below what last season's primary domestic rightsholder, DAZN, was charging.
The UK arm of Prime Video also hosted the Ligue 1 direct-to-consumer PPV service in the UK across the 2024-25 campaign, before a domestic offering in France was launched.
Prime Video previously served as the rightsholder for Ligue 1 in France between the 2020-21 and 2023-24 campaigns, stepping in after the collapse of the league’s original deal with Mediapro.
On the launch of the channel, LFP Media director general Nicolas de Tavernost said: “We are taking control of our own destiny, we expect a difficult couple of years ahead when it comes to the establishment of an asset, the returns of this channel will be progressive.”
Speaking to French outlet RMC, LFP president Vincent Labrune added: “We have greatly reduced our Ligue 1 clubs’ dependence on domestic rights.
“All our economic indicators are on the rise. Commercial rights, international rights, UEFA rights… Yes, there is a problem with domestic rights, but it's not for lack of looking for solutions for two and a half years, solutions that we haven't found because the market is what it is."
“We have club owners who are ready and who have all endorsed this channel project, which is a medium- to long-term project, because they have the means to cope with one or two years without domestic rights. We must stop thinking that Ligue 1 will collapse because there are no domestic rights.
“The channel is risky, it’s not easy, but it’s exciting. It’s an adventure, and it’s disruptive. We said we wanted to create an innovative league. French football also means launching your own product.”
