Last year a brand new streaming service called Quibi was announced in the U.S. Short for ‘Quick Bites’ it’s different to competitors like Netflix or Stan because each episode of every show is less than 10 minutes long and can only be streamed on a mobile device. It just launched overseas and while it hadn’t been confirmed for Australia yet, you can get it here right now legally and without a VPN.
What Is Quibi?
Quibi is a mobile-only streaming service where the episodes are less than 10 minutes long and new episodes for a lot of the content is added daily. This is quite cool, and smart, as it doesn’t ask for a huge time commitment but if you end up loving something you’ll end up coming back every day.
The app will give you recommendations like other streaming services do, and you can also save shows you want to follow. You can toggle to your favourite shows easily from the bottom rail of the app. Episodes can also be downloaded for offline viewing.
Show suggestions and saved shows in the Quibi app
You can view the content either in landscape or portrait mode and some shows are even designed to take advantage of the ability to switch between the two. It’s called the ‘Turnstyle’ feature and it lets you shift the content POV when you turn your phone.
What Shows Are On Quibi
Despite being such a weird format there are a lot of big names attached to some of the original content – from actors to directors.
Sophie Turner from Game of Thrones stars in a show called Survive where she has to fight for her life after a plane crash in the mountains. Liam Hemsworth plays a guy who gets hunted for 24 hours for a huge cash payoff in The Most Dangerous Game and Kiefer Sutherland will be in a rebooted version of The Fugitive. The first two shows are available now.
On the director front we’re looking forward to Steven Spielberg’s After Dark, which can only be watched at night, Sam Raimi’s 50 States of Fright which is about urban legends and Guillermo del Toro’s untitled zombie project. Sadly none of these are live yet.
So far I have been into watching Murder House Flip (It’s exactly what it sounds like), Shape of Pasta (an documentary where a chef explores the craft and culture of pasta in Italy), Flipped (think The Block but you’re renovating a drug cartel’s mansion. It’s a comedy starring Will Forte and Kaitlin Olson from It’s Always Sunny) and Dismantled (a cooking show hosted by Tituss Burgess where contestant have to recreate a dish that is show at them from a canon or something).
And for anyone really missing nature thanks to self isolation, The Daily Chill offers new footage daily of majestic walks. Day one is a beach in California.
We have a larger list of current and upcoming shows right here.
How To Watch Quibi In Australia
Despite not having a confirmed release date for Australia, it is already working here and you don’t need a VPN. If you’re on Android you can get it on the Google Play Store and for iOS you can get it on the App Store.
To sign up you just need an email address and it’s a quick process.
How Much Quibi Costs In Australia
Quibi is free for the first 90 days, which isn’t bad for a trial period. After that it costs $12.99 a month in Australia. This is where we differ from the U.S. because over there you can opt to stay on a free plan, but it comes with ads. We don’t have that option.
$12.99 may seem a bit steep for such short episodes, but this is balanced out really well by getting 3 months for free. Hopefully by then a bunch of the yet-to-be-released shows will be on there.
Thanks to good mate Fergus Halliday from PC World for letting me know this was working. He has a guide on how to install Quibi right here.