How to watch the Cubs in 2025: Schedule, broadcast info, blackout rules and national games

First, let’s revisit this celebration after the Cubs won the 2016 World Series. All together now:

Now, to present day, when the North Siders have real playoff aspirations with Kyle Tucker in tow. Yeah, it’s early, but they took a three-game series from the Dodgers in Los Angeles and won one of those games 16-0. A clear summer afternoon at The Friendly Confines will lift the spirits of casual fans and all-162 lifers.

The Cubs should be fun to watch as NL Central favorites, but accessing the games and navigating streaming restrictions has never been more complicated. Here’s all you need to know to keep up with the Cubs this season. Make sure you’re following the team in your feed. Patrick Mooney and Sahadev Sharma are consummate pros who have been on the beat for years. Founding editor Jon Greenberg will write from Wrigley in big moments (and for critical hot dog studies ).

How to stream regional Chicago Cubs broadcasts in-market

Fubo (try for free)

Fubo is a cable-cutter streaming platform that provides local and national channels with add-on sports packages. Any game on Marquee Sports Network, ESPN, Fox or MLB Network can be streamed here (more on those below). TBS games cannot.

What you need to watch these games: The “pro” plan starts at $84.99 monthly, with an extra charge for 4K ultra-HD. For more, there is the MLB.TV add-on, which streams every out-of-market game for $29.99 a month, and the “sports lite” package (with MLB Network) for $9.99 a month.

Marquee Sports Network

This is the franchise’s regional sports network (RSN) with exclusive television rights for all local broadcasts. It was launched in 2020 and is named after the ballpark’s famous art deco marquee with bright red paint. The Sinclair syndicate station replaced NBC Sports Chicago and WGN.

Jon Sciambi has done play-by-play here since 2021. The average fan will instantly recognize him from ESPN’s “Sunday Night Baseball” and the “MLB: The Show” video games, but “Boog” spends most of his season with the Cubs. Jim Deshaies is on color commentary. The southpaw played for six teams across his 12-year career and never took the mound for Chicago, but he most certainly was in the booth throughout the Cubs’ 2016 World Series run.

Marquee also has a standalone app with a team pass for in-market viewers. Folks with eligible cable providers can use their login credentials to get in. Here’s the full broadcast area:

What you need to watch these games: Fubo, DirecTV Stream (starting $80-90 monthly), Marquee Sports Network App ($20 per month for a team pass)

How to watch the regional broadcasts on cable or satellite

What you need to watch these games: A carrier that has the Marquee Sports Network. If we enter the Wrigleyville ZIP code (60613) in the list of providers, here are our cable results:

How to watch the regional broadcasts out-of-market

Perhaps you’re a Midwesterner far from home, or maybe you fell for “Rookie of the Year” as an impressionable youth. It’s all good — you can still catch Boog and Jim with an extra subscription.

The MLB.TV package includes every regular-season game across the league (excluding national games and in-market games for your region). It costs $150 annually. Fubo offers an MLB.TV add-on for $29.99 a month.

Meanwhile, MLB Network airs almost 300 local broadcasts for national audiences so that out-of-towners can catch some Cubs games there. MLB Network also offers 26 unique, produced-in-house “showcase” games that are not subject to local blackouts.

What you need to watch these games: MLB Network for select games / MLB.TV for all of them

How to watch the national TV games

ESPN

The league has partnered with ESPN since 1990; that ends this fall. Yup, the purveyors of the iconic music are indeed opting out of their remaining baseball broadcasts. For this season, you’ll still find select primetime Cubs matchups here. Sciambi and Karl Ravech are usually on the mic, alongside five-time World Series winner David Cone and former utility hitter Eduardo Pérez. Generational baseball narrator Joe Buck returned to the booth for a memorable Opening Day affair, but he’s sticking with football now. For ESPN, think Sundays, especially “Sunday Night Baseball.”

Chicago’s first-half schedule includes one ESPN spot: Sunday, April 27, against Bryce Harper and the Philadelphia Phillies. The second-half slate will be announced later this summer.

Fox/FS1

Fox is where you’ll hear Joe Davis (voice of the Dodgers), Jason Benetti (Tigers) or local product Adam Amin (the NBA’s Bulls) on the call. Retired Silver Slugger catcher A.J. Pierzynski (boo as you wish, Cubs fans), Cardinals bellwether Adam Wainwright (again, as you wish), 1992 Rookie of the Year Eric Karros and Dontrelle Willis (aka the D-Train!) rotate in the booth. Three Hall-of-Famers are on this network: Derek Jeter and David Ortiz during the pregame and John Smoltz for color commentary. The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal can be seen reporting from the field, too. Fox usually has a Saturday spot.

Our protagonists have a few upcoming Saturday stages here. They’ll be at home against Philly on April 26, then they’ll meet the Mets in Queens on May 10. The Astros welcome them on June 28, then the Cubs host the Red Sox on July 19. The ever-hot Cubs-Cardinals rivalry gets the Fox treatment on August 9. A sixth and final Fox broadcast is slated for September 18 at Cincinnati.

TBS

This is the Tuesday action, with Brian Anderson (Brewers) and Ron Darling (Mets) as the mainstays. It’s a stacked pre-postgame show: all-time great Pedro Martínez, 2007 NL MVP Jimmy Rollins and three-time All-Star Curtis Granderson (who grew up in South Chicago suburbs Blue Island and Lynwood). TBS games can also be streamed on Max. The playoff broadcasts add decorated former player and manager Dusty Baker to the studio. Bob Costas was on the mic here before his retirement last fall. No Cubs games have been announced on TBS yet.

Roku

The purple metropolis now has “MLB Sunday Leadoff” games free from blackout restrictions. Roku will have the Cubs-Mets matchup on Sunday, May 11.

Apple TV+

Like with Roku, you can stream more baseball games from your smart TV. Unlike Roku, the Apple TV+ games are regionally blacked out. Alex Faust (also of NHL and Jeopardy fame ) is on these calls, as is Wayne Randazzo (Angels). The Cubs will be on Apple TV twice: May 2 (at Milwaukee) and June 6 (at Detroit).

For national MLB games in general, think:

Chicago Cubs odds for 2025

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