Vudu touts more than 11,000 movies and TV episodes as free content. A search of the free movies catalog turned up more than 8,200 options. The free television catalog has more than 850 seasons of TV series. Vudu says it’s also working on new original content.

Popular Movies

There are some big Hollywood stars attached to movies in the free streaming portion of Vudu. However, as you may have guessed, there are not many titles that we’d consider “new releases” in this section. Those are reserved for rental or purchase with Vudu.com/start . Instead, the free movie menu has a selection of films that are a bit older. Some may already be found on traditional cable television stations.

Content available for free streaming changes often. Here’s a look at some of the movies available for free as of March 2023:

• A Turtle’s Tale
• Alpha and Omega 2
• Beauty and the Beast
• Highlander
• Iceman
• Vice
• Titanic 2
• The House on Pine Street
• Crazy on the Outside
• What Just Happened

Titles such as No Country for Old Men, Final Destination, Seven, Jerry Maguire and Hancock have been free on the platform in the past.

Popular TV Series

The free section of Vudu’s TV offering touts 633 seasons of television series. Much like the movie selection, the more recognizable titles are a bit dated. There are some recognizable and still-relevant children’s options like Thomas the Tank Engine.

Here’s a sampling of the TV series available for streaming:

• Heartland
• Alf
• The Beverly Hillbillies
• Doc Martin
• Real Ghost Stories
• Salem Witch Trials
• Hell’s Kitchen
• Highlander
• Unsolved Mysteries
• Wildfire

Shows such as Roseanne, The Addams Family, Forensic Files and Blue’s Clues have been available for free streaming on the platform in the past.

Original Content

Though there were more impressive plans for original content for Vudu at one point in time, there are only two titles unique to the service to date.

There is a 12-episode TV series titled Mr. Mom that debuted in 2019 and an original film titled Adventure Force 5.

User Experience for Vudu

Now that you have a better idea of the type of free content that is available on Vudu, let’s look at the user experience.

How Bad Are the Ads?

There’s a price to pay for free streaming, and it’s with your time and patience for sitting through advertising.

Vudu.com start code hits you with commercials before your content even starts, which I find less than ideal. If you are unsure about a series you’ve never seen before and want to test out a few minutes of the show before deciding to watch the whole episode, you’re already locked into a commercial break. That’s smart on Vudu’s part but painful for the user. Using the Roku app, I routinely saw three 20-second commercials before my programming even started.

I charted a random episode of Roseanne to see what the user experience was like. Here’s a quick breakdown of the advertisements.

TV Episode Ad Breakdown

Four breaks seem like a lot for a show that has a runtime of under 22 minutes, but I guess that depends on your perspective. At just under four minutes of commercials, the episode took approximately 26 minutes to watch from beginning to end.

On more than one occasion, I encountered an interactive advertisement that gave me pricing and a way to click a link for more information or to purchase. That may be useful to some users, but others may consider it intrusive.

Repetitiveness was another issue with the ads. The same group of five or six advertisements inevitably appeared in heavy rotation during most of my commercial breaks.

User Interface

Vudu does a really nice job of sectioning off its ad-based free content from the content that it is selling or renting. To find yourself on the free content via mobile app, you’ll want to click the triple-lined menu bar at the top left corner of the screen and select “Free.” From Roku app or web, the free option is right there on the homepage.

Once you’re in the free section, Vudu makes it pretty easy to sort through movies and TV series separately. I found it handy that you can toggle between “Most Watched” and “Release Date” options to quickly see what is popular and what is new. Utilizing the filters allows you to apply genre constraints to those options as well.

When you click on a piece of content from the menu, Vudu offers you a good amount of information on the product prior to viewing, which is nice. For example, take a look at this preview card on Scooby-Doo: The Movie. It offers a Rotten Tomatoes rating, Vudu users rating, viewing age suggestion, a preview trailer and more.

Tips for Enjoying Vudu

Has some of the available content caught your attention? Here are some tips for enjoying it on Vudu:

• Grab Your Snacks Early: Given the predictability of the advertisements prior to the beginning of the content, you have a built-in opportunity to ignore the first set of commercials while getting yourself prepared to watch the show. Use it to your advantage.
• Utilize Kids Mode: If you have children in your life, it probably is worthwhile to utilize this function. Vudu offers the ability to set up pin codes and block certain types of content that may not be age-appropriate for your entire household.
• Connect Your Walmart.com Account: If you already have an account through Walmart.com, it will be a bit of a time-saver to simply log in with that. Also, there are sometimes perks from purchases made on Walmart.com that could net you additional free or discounted content on your Vudu account.