Amazon’s Thursday Night Football: 5 Things You Might Not Know About It

By Phillip Swann
The TV Answer Man –Follow me on X.

Amazon’s Thursday Night Football returns tonight (October 24) at 7 p.m. ET with a matchup between the New York Jets (2-6) and Houston Texans (6-2). Although the etailer giant has had the exclusive rights to TNF since 2022, many fans are still unaware of some of the finer ins and outs of the streamcast. Here are five features of Amazon’s Thursday Night Football that might help you better enjoy the weekly contests.

1. You don’t need an Amazon Prime membership to watch the games. 

Although the games are free as part of an Amazon Prime membership, you can also watch for free on Twitch, the Amazon-owned gaming service. However, if you’ve been thinking of signing up for Prime, the membership costs $14.99 a month or $139 a year. Amazon also offers a 30-day free trial to anyone who hasn’t been a member in the last 12 months. A separate subscription to Prime Video costs $8.99 a month. Note that Prime Video has a 30-day free trial.

2. You can record the games so you can watch later. 

Can you record the Amazon games? Pause, rewind and fast-forward the action just like you would with a game on a pay TV service? Answer: Yes! To record a Thursday Night Football game, go to the game’s detail page and click “Record Thursday Night Football. If the recording is enabled, you will see “Recording enabled” on the detail page. Once enabled for one TNF Game, recording will stay active for all of the following TNF games this season and the replays will be available until the start of the next season. However, if you do not record the game, you will not be able to watch it after the broadcast has concluded. But if you enable the recording feature before the game starts, you will have access to a full game replay and be able to watch the live game from the beginning if you tune in late.

But take note: If you enable recording during the game, you will have access to the full game replay only, and limited ability to rewind to earlier in the game. Enabling the feature after the game will provide you access to future game replays (but not the one just played) and the ability to watch from the beginning.

3. You can watch the games in 1080p HDR and Dolby Surround Sound.

The tech giant has won plaudits from critics (and most) fans for its weekly TNF presentations which have been delivered with relatively few technical glitches that you sometimes find during live sports broadcasts on other streaming services. In 2022, Amazon’s first season of carrying TNF contests, the company offered 1080p HD SDR (Standard Dynamic Range) streams. While 1080p HD SDR is an upgrade over what you see during NFL games on CBS (1080i) and Fox (720p), it cannot display the color range and vividness of a 1080p HDR (High Dynamic Range) image.

So last year, Amazon upgraded to 1080p HD HDR and it has stayed with that format in 2024. It’s not 4K, but it does provide a sharper and more colorful picture than in 2022. (As reference, Apple also uses 1080p HDR for its MLB broadcasts.)

The Amazon TNF games will also be available in Dolby Surround Sound audio and each game will be delivered with what the company says is ‘ultra low latency’ which is designed to reduce the delay between the real time action and what you see at home. As you may know, live streaming is often up to a minute behind the actual play, but Amazon last year cut that gap to around 20-25 seconds for most games.

4. The Amazon broadcast has multiple feeds including one for Spanish and one for stats lovers.

The tech giant offers the traditional broadcast as well as a Spanish-language version and an alternative feed called, Prime Vision With Next Gen Stats. But what is different about PV With NGS? Is it worth checking out?

For starters, the camera for the alternative feed is set higher than the normal broadcast camera, allowing you to see every player on the field during play. In addition, when certain players come up to the line, and sometimes during the play itself, they are placed in virtual circles with name tags to help you identify who’s doing what. There are other on-screen stats and graphics from time to time such as the field goal probability from certain distances, a clock showing the time a play takes to unfold, and on-field virtual lines to show a receiver’s route. It has a video game feel and I can’t say that everyone would enjoy it. But if you’re not heavily invested in the outcome of the game you’re watching, it might be worth checking out for a few minutes at least.

5. You can watch Amazon’s Thursday Night Football in bars.

DIRECTV has partnered with Amazon to show the Thursday Night Football games in more than 300,000 commercial venues across the nation. The satcaster, which has provided the NFL Sunday Tickets in bars and restaurants for years, has a Sports Bar Finder app that can tell you which places in your area will have both the Amazon games and the Sunday Ticket. See this article for more details.

Have a question about new TV technologies? Send it to The TV Answer Man at swann@tvanswerman.com Please include your first name and hometown in your message.

The TV Answer Man is veteran journalist Phillip Swann who has covered the TV technology scene for more than three decades. He will report on the latest news and answer your questions regarding new devices and services that are changing the way you watch television. See the bio for Phillip Swann here.