Watching local news

Does this sound familiar? Having dropped cable, you start streaming everything. Then you hear about a local news story that someone says is covered by the local TV station. The question: how do you watch it?

Well, honestly, the answer is that you might not be able to.

You see, there's no guarantee you'll be able to watch local news streaming. Oh, you'll be able to watch some, but it may be that only some local news is available. And that some is not.

I don't live in a big city. I live a little away from Savannah, and have always watched the Savannah stations as the "local" stations. And many of my family members today have Savannah stations as their local. However, some family has Jacksonville as their local stations. So, extending things out, I have two "local" markets from which to choose, though for me, Savannah is the primary.

I read an article on Cord Cutters News recently about streaming local news for free. And, in some places, people will be able to do that. However, for me, it's not quite as rosy as Luke Bouma's article makes it seem.

NewsON offers live news from all over the United States. In total, they have over 275 local news stations streaming on its website through its app on the most popular devices. You can learn more on their website HERE.

Haystack News also offers both live and on-demand news streaming for free online from a ton of news stations, including local Nexstar stations. You can learn more on their website HERE.

Local Now is one more free option that includes a ton of local news stations plus curated local news programs from The Weather Channels’ parent company. You can learn more on their website HERE.

First, the suggestion of using an antenna is a good one. If you can't use an antenna to get the stations -- and yes, there are places where an antenna just won't work -- then streaming is your only option.

So, for the four local news outlets -- Savannah's WSAV (NBC), WTOC (CBS), WJCL (ABC), and WTGS (Fox) -- I can stream local news from only two of those.

• NewsOn gets me WJCL (ABC) local news only.
• Local Now also only gets WJCL local news.
• Haystack provides WSAV (NBC) local news, along with WJCL local news.

The other options listed in the Cord Cutters News article don't get me any local news.

In none of these do the CBS or Fox affiliate local news streams occur. Those aren't available for me. For free, that is.

Live streaming services such as YouTube TV, Fubo, Hulu+Live TV, DirecTV streaming, and such do offer local news, because they offer the entire local stations in the lineup. Not just news, but the entire broadcast stream.

Those services are expensive, running $65/month or more. For $10, I can get local CBS as part of Paramount Plus. For $10, I can get local NBC as part of Peacock TV. But that's it.

My Streaming Life has had to deal with limited local news, when not using an antenna. It's one of the drawbacks of streaming. I wish it was different, but this is the way it is. I hope that changes soon.