Forget Netflix, Amazon Prime and all the other streaming services draining your bank account every month the smartest binge-watchers are heading somewhere completely different: the library.
No, not to read, to log into Kanopy, the secret weapon in savvy streamers’ arsenals. If you’ve never heard of it, you’re not alone.
Kanopy is a totally free, ad-free streaming platform offering thousands of critically acclaimed dramas, documentaries, comedies and classic films.
The catch? You need a library card or university login to access it. That’s it. No fees, no faff. Kanopy has Happy Valley, Inside No. 9, The Thick of It, and Sherwood.
It’s also got Call the Midwife, Boiling Point, and enough BBC Studios hits to rival iPlayer. This isn’t your DVD shelf, it’s a curated, highbrow feast for anyone who misses the “Browse” button actually surprising them.
The film section is just as elite. Anora, this year’s Oscar Best Picture winner, is on there. So is Wicked, Clueless, 13 Going on 30, and Cannes festival darling Universal Language.
You can stream an under-the-radar arthouse comedy and a Y2K romcom double bill without spending a penny or sitting through 12 minutes of ads for fast food and mattresses.
‘You need to get Kanopy it’s free and amazing. Thank me later,’ said one fan on X. Another wrote: ‘I literally got a library card to get Kanopy lol. I’m obsessed.’
The streamer launched back in 2008 when founder Olivia Humphrey decided students needed more than grainy YouTube clips to learn from.
Her goal? Make high-quality cinema and documentaries part of education, and ideally, entertainment too. She once called Kanopy “the Netflix of education”.
Unlike other freebies like Tubi or Pluto TV, Kanopy has no adverts, no auto-play junk, and no fake-looking knock-offs. It’s quality over quantity - but still manages to boast over 30,000 titles.
There is a small caveat: The streamer’s users are given a set number of “tickets” each month by their library (usually around 6-10 titles), and different programmes cost different amounts of tickets.
But there’s a hack: some content costs zero tickets, meaning you can binge it endlessly. Just filter by “0 tickets” and enjoy.
Reddit is obsessed. One user gushed, “Kanopy is the greatest free resource for any film lover,” while another called it “a wild library of godsend titles.” Even PCMag gave it 4.5 stars, calling it “top-tier” and “a wealth of independent, ad-free educational and entertainment content.”
So if you’re bored of algorithms recommending the same beige content, all you need is a library card.
Sign up here
