How can I watch Swedish TV online from outside Sweden?

I am living in Budapest at the moment and want to see Swedish TV online (svt.se), but I get an error message that it is not possible. I think it is because I try to watch the live feed from outside Sweden. Can you help me?

Thank you for the question! The problem you have is very common as TV channels use a so-called geo-block to only let people inside the country watch their live broadcasts. The result is that when you try to watch the live feed of SVT.se (SVT Play) from outside Sweden you will get the following error message:

Error message on SVT.se
The following error message comes up in Swedish: “Videon är inte tillgänglig. Det kan finnas flera olika skäl till att du inte kan se videon.”

To fix this problem you need to do make the Swedish television page (SVT.se) believe that you are actually watching the webpage from within Sweden. That can easily be done, all you need to do is to get a Swedish IP address. A very easy way to get a Swedish IP address is to make a subscription to NordVPN. As you visit their page you can make a subscription for 1 month, 3 months, 6 months or 1 year. Once the subscription is made you can download their program and once downloaded you log in with your username and password, select a server in Sweden and in totally 5-10 minutes from now you can watch the live feed from SVT.se online.

We just tried this (writing the article from Hungary) and here you can see a screenshot what SVT.se live stream looked like after connecting to the Swedish server and restarting our browser.

watch STV live from outside Sweden
Watching STVPlay live from outside Sweden with NordVPN.

The program will also let you select servers from other nations in the world, so you can for example use this in the same way to watch the British channel ITV online and thus see British X-Factor and other shows. A very useful tool which we can warmly recommend through own experience. In addition to these services the program will also encrypt your Internet connection. This is very useful if you use open WiFi networks in cafes, restaurants and hotels, because this is normally very vulnerable and it is easy to steal your information as you use open/non secure WiFi networks. Once you use NordVPN to connect your information will be encrypted and you can surf the web safely.

Useful links:
NordVPN
SVT.se
SVTPlay.se

2 thoughts on “How can I watch Swedish TV online from outside Sweden?

  1. Emily says:

    How do you go about paying for the TV channel subscriptions when some only accept credit cards issued in Sweden? Or some ask for a Swedish mobile number to create an account?

    • Budapest Guide says:

      If they require you to have a payment card issued in Sweden that is a problem hard to solve without a Swedish card. Which service is it that require a payment card issued in Sweden that is causing this trouble? Viaplay?

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