The Roku Live TV Guide includes a lot of free channels: Here's what you get

The Roku Live TV Guide includes a lot of free channels: Here's what you get

Roku Live TV Guide is the latest salvo on the free side of the streaming wars. Launched today, the Roku Live TV Guide is a new way for viewers to find free TV channels (both live and non-live) without having to install a single app.

The Roku Live TV Guide has over 100 channels, which are called live and linear and are similar to those found on Pluto TV. Therefore, when Roku calls a show Live TV Guide, know that some of its programming is live and other content is not. Linear in this case means that it is broadcast based on a schedule.

The Live TV Guide has all the visual bells and whistles of a traditional TV guide, with the ability to scroll horizontally to navigate time zones and vertically to scroll through channels.

Roku also revealed how much it has grown The Roku Channel's free and premium streaming content library.

The Roku Live TV Guide began appearing on the Roku Channel app on June 1; Roku is releasing the Live TV Guide in staggered waves, much like when Instagram rolls out new features to specific user groups in the span of a few months.

The launch of the Roku Live TV Guide comes as Roku launches the 100+ live and/or linear "channels" that make up the service. These channels are divided into six distinct groups:

News: ABC News Live, Black News Channel, Cheddar, Newsy, Now This, Reuters, USA Today, and Yahoo Finance, WeatherNation

Movies and TV: Crime360, FilmRise Action, FilmRise Classic TV, FilmRise Family, FilmRise Free Movies, Gravitas Movies, Redbox Free Movies, Voyager Documentaries

Sports: ACC Digital Network, Adventure Sports Network, bein sports xtra, Edge Sport, Fubo Sports Network, Outside TV

Entertainment: BET Pluto, CMT Pluto, Comedy Central Pluto, Deal or No Deal, Game Show Central, MTV Pluto

Kids: Ameba, battery pop Ameba, battery pop, Kidz Bop, Rainbow Ruby, Teletubbies, Kid Gamer TV, pocket watches, Toon Goggles, Toon Goggles Jr. Condé Nast Traveler, Glamour, GQ, Food52, Vanity Fair, This Old House, Vogue

Spanish: AFV en Español, américatevé, Latido Music, Love Nature en Español, [25 Español,

Of course, these channels are advertising-driven.

To return from live content to the Roku Live TV guide and the actual channel, press left on the Roku remote control. Press left again in the guide window to jump to the list of recently viewed channels.

This is important because, although the grid of channels is organized by category, no one wants to click through 100 channels to find the right one. The star/asterisk buttons allow you to view channels in a grouped list.

Organized chronologically, the Roku Live TV Guide displays the next 12 hours of programming so you can see what will be airing later. It is unfortunate, however, that there is no search function.

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