When Hulu first previewed its live TV service, one of the more important features missing was mobile notifications. In the demo previously showcased, a user would get an alert about a basketball game with a tight score heading into the final moments of a game.
Now it’s months later, and Hulu has yet to actually build out mobile alerts, something that could help the service stand out and better compete with Sling TV, YouTube TV, DirecTV Now, and PlayStation Vue. This is all now changing with this months’ March Madness tournament.
Customer who have Hulu’s Live TV service and choose their favorite March Madness team(s) will be able to get notifications whenever a game involving their teams is about to start. For the basketball tournament, Hulu has introduced a new portal and will help customize that presentation for users based on the teams they select.
At launch, these game notifications will be strictly for March Madness. But Hulu says that it’s planning to enable notifications for all live sports games after this first test period. This period will allow the company to gather valuable data and feedback to ensure those notifications are relevant once it officially brings the feature to everyone after March Madness test.
Since the company doesn’t want to annoy users with boat loads of notifications and their phones vibrating constantly, game start notifications are just the start. The company will use feedback to continue to fine tune the feature.
In addition to the feature, Hulu is adding a substantial number of live TV channels to its streaming service at 60 frames per second. You can check out the full updated list of 60 FPS channels below:
A&E
Adult Swim
Big Ten Network
Bravo
Cartoon Network
CBS Sports Network
Cinemax – All channels
CNN
CNN International
E!
Food Network
FOX affiliates
FOX Business Network
FOX News Channel
FOX Sports – All RSNs
FOX Sports 1
FOX Sports 2
FX/FXM/FXX
FYI
Golf Channel
HBO – All channels
HGTV
History
HLN
Lifetime
LMN
Nat Geo WILD
National Geographic
NBC – All affiliates, as well as New England Channel News
NBC Sports – All RSNs
Oxygen
POP
SHOWTIME – All channels
Smithsonian
SyFy
TBS
TCM
Telemundo – All affiliates
TNT
Travel Channel
TruTV
Universal Kids (East)
Viceland
YES
