The San Francisco 49ers are on the road for their third preseason game of the year on Saturday. They face the Denver Broncos, with kickoff scheduled for 6 p.m. PT. The game will primarily be broadcast locally on KPIX, which is the Bay Area's CBS station. It is not nationally broadcast, but will be available throughout the 49ers and Broncos broadcast region.
None of the 49ers preseason games will be broadcast nationally, but there is a legal streaming option at your disposal. Unfortunately, NFL.com stopped the $20 Preseason Live option. You used to be able to watch every preseason game live, except those broadcast nationally, and if you lived in the local broadcast market. This year, the NFL changed that option. The league previously offered Preseason Live and NFL Rewind (for watching regular season games after the fact, and getting coaches' film) as two separate packages. This year, they have combined those two into one package called NFL Game Pass that costs $99.99.
If you had NFL Rewind last year and auto-renewed, you got the total package for $69.99, so that is a plus. However, if you had only previously purchased Preseason Live, you're left without the same option. That's the bad news.
How to watch 49ers-Broncos and 49ers-Chargers online for free
I've run this post a couple times now, but want to make sure and keep providing updated details. If you signed for up the free trial last Sunday, you can still get Saturday's 49ers-Broncos game. If you started the free trial before Sunday, you won't get the Broncos game for free. Make sure and cancel if that's the case, so you don't get charged after the seven days are up. To do so, click on your username after you log in. Then down below you'll see "Payment Method" and a "Cancel Subscription" option.
If you did not use the free trial last week, here is what to do:
NFL.com is offering a free 7-day trial that can let you watch the 49ers-Broncos game for free without paying up for the whole Game Pass option. You would have to provide your credit card number and then actively go in and cancel it before the seven days is up, but if you do that, you can get one preseason game for free.
If you sign up for it Friday and onward, you'll get the Saturday August 29 49ers-Broncos game, and then you can also watch the following Thursday, September 3 when the 49ers host the Chargers. And you can do all this without paying the $99 fee for Game Pass.
Whatever you do, those are your options to avoid giving the NFL your money in what strikes me as a cash-grab in poor form. I appreciate that I can save money as a person who uses both Rewind and Preseason Live, but this strikes me as unfair for those who only use Preseason Live. I'm curious to see how many of those people will dole out the $99.99 for it this year.
Reminder: If you sign up, you have to actively go in and cancel your subscription before the seven days is up.