Ligue 1 — Where to Watch

Ligue 1 is the least stable rights picture of any major European league, and we would rather say so plainly than present a tidy table that may already be wrong. Two things happened in quick succession. DAZN took the French rights, withdrew after a single season in a payment dispute with the league, and then returned. And for 2026-27 the league launched its own service, Ligue 1+, which is now the main broadcaster in France.

That makes France the one market where the answer to "who shows this?" changes faster than a guide can track, and it is why some of the prices below are marked as unverified. Where we could not confirm the rights holder, we have said so instead of guessing.

Country	Who shows it	Free option
France	Ligue 1+ became the main broadcaster for 2026-27, carrying all nine matches per matchday plus Ligue 3. DAZN resells it as a bundle	None. French law protects national team matches, cup finals and European finals — not Ligue 1
Belgium	DAZN Belgium, and Proximus Pickx, both of which carry Ligue 1	None
Switzerland	DAZN, whose Swiss storefront lists Ligue 1	None confirmed
Germany	DAZN	DAZN's free tier includes selected live Ligue 1 matches each week
Netherlands	Viaplay	None confirmed
Portugal	Sport TV	None
Japan	DAZN Japan	Free highlights on DAZN
South Korea	Coupang Play	None
Sub-Saharan Africa	Canal+ Afrique, whose Sport+ channels carry Ligue 1. StarTimes is also listed as carrying it, but that listing is old and may be out of date	None
MENA	beIN Sports is listed as carrying Ligue 1. Our source is second-hand — verify before subscribing	None
UK	Not confirmed in our research	None confirmed
United States	Not confirmed in our research	None confirmed
Canada	Not listed by DAZN Canada, whose football slate covers the Premier League, Bundesliga, LaLiga, Serie A and the EFL instead	None confirmed
Spain & Italy	Not confirmed in our research	None confirmed

Read the French section twice. DAZN's French page advertises a "DAZN + Ligue 1+" bundle from €14.99/month, while a separate reading of DAZN's own French pages showed bundle tiers at €22.99 and €27.99. The relationship between DAZN and the Ligue 1+ venture is genuinely murky, and the reported direct price of Ligue 1+ itself is €14.99/month on a 12-month term, €19.99 flexible and €179.99 for the year. We could not verify those figures against the official page, so treat them as a starting point rather than a quote.

Can you watch it free?

Nowhere we could verify. France has one of the strongest free-to-air protections in Europe, and it is worth understanding why Ligue 1 still is not covered by it.

French law keeps a list of events of major importance that cannot be locked behind an exclusive paywall. It includes every match of the French national team, the semi-finals and final of the World Cup and the European Championship, the finals of the Champions League, Europa League and Conference League when a French club is involved, the Coupe de France final, and the Six Nations. The French domestic league is not on the list. So the free football in France is international and cup football, not the weekly league, and the same pattern repeats in every other market: no broadcaster has decided that giving Ligue 1 away brings enough back.

Germany — DAZN's free tier includes selected live Ligue 1 matches each week, with a free account. This is the most accessible free Ligue 1 we found.
Japan — free highlights on DAZN Japan.
Everywhere else — nothing we could confirm as genuinely free and legal.

How we define "free". Every option on this site is either a public broadcaster, a free ad-supported tier, an official free trial, or a rights-holder's own channel. We do not list or link to unlicensed rebroadcasts. Note that a VPN does not make a stream legal: reaching a service licensed for another country normally breaches that service's terms, and the bigger platforms actively block it.

The cheapest legal route

France — the Ligue 1+ direct subscription is reported to be the cheaper of the two routes, because buying through DAZN bundles in a wider sports package you may not want. Verify both prices on the day you buy.
Belgium — DAZN Belgium runs a free freemium tier for cup football and highlights, and its paid plan has been promoted at €14.99/month for the first three months.
Germany — check DAZN's free tier before paying anything, then decide whether the €24.99/month plan is worth it for the rest.
Netherlands — Viaplay's cheapest tier carries ads; check whether Ligue 1 sits in that tier or only in the higher one.
Sub-Saharan Africa — Canal+ Afrique prices differ by country and package, so there is no single figure we can quote.

Why this league is so unstable

Ligue 1's problem is that its international rights are worth far less than its domestic ones, so the French market carries almost the whole cost of the competition. When the domestic deal ran into trouble, the league ended up building its own streaming service — a step no other major league has taken at this scale. For a viewer, that means the safest habit is to check the league's own site before buying a subscription, because the reseller arrangements underneath it have already changed once.

Who shows Ligue 1 in France now?

Ligue 1+, the league’s own service, became the main broadcaster for 2026-27, carrying all nine matches per matchday plus Ligue 3. DAZN resells it as a bundle, which is why you may see two prices for what looks like the same thing.

Why did DAZN leave Ligue 1 and come back?

DAZN withdrew after one season in a payment dispute with the French league, and later returned to market a Ligue 1+ bundle. The exact commercial relationship between DAZN and the Ligue 1+ venture is not something we could pin down, so verify before subscribing.

Is Ligue 1 free anywhere?

Not that we could verify. France’s free-to-air list covers the national team, the World Cup and European Championship closing rounds and the European club finals, but not the domestic league. In Germany, DAZN’s free tier carries selected live Ligue 1 matches.

Can I watch Ligue 1 in the UK or the US?

We could not confirm the current rights holder in either market, so we have not recommended a service. Given how often this league’s rights have moved, check the league’s own broadcaster list before paying for anything.

Does DAZN carry Ligue 1 in Canada?

No. DAZN Canada’s football slate is the Premier League, Bundesliga, LaLiga, Serie A, the EFL and all three UEFA competitions. Ligue 1 is not among them.

Are Ligue 1 prices reliable?

Less so than any other league on this site. Reported figures for Ligue 1+ and the DAZN bundle conflict, so we have published them as they came to us and flagged them rather than presenting a single confident number.

Where to go next

Bundesliga Serie A LaLiga DAZN country by country Free live streams