Disney+ Now Live in India, With Originals in The Mandalorian, on Disney+ Hotstar

[Cyberghost]

*i.gadgets360cdn.com/large/disney_plus_india_1583904352933.jpg​

Disney+ is now live in India, eighteen days early. Mere hours after Hotstar was rebranded to Disney+ Hotstar, Disney+ originals — from The Mandalorian to Marvel's Hero Project — are now available on the streaming service in India. Per our estimates, the new content went live around 10am on Wednesday. That's in addition to content from Disney's back catalogue that has rolled in the past two days, including Marvel Cinematic Universe films such as Captain America: Civil War and Doctor Strange, Pixar titles A Bug's Life and Cars 3, National Geographic's Oscar-winning documentary Free Solo, and a bunch of kids' TV shows featuring the likes of Mickey Mouse, Rapunzel, and Timon & Pumbaa.

Over the past two days, Hotstar quietly updated its Android and iOS app to Disney+ Hotstar, featuring a new logo and colour theme. The new design is not yet live on Hotstar's website. For what it's worth, the aforementioned Disney+ originals are available across the board — on the website, mobile, tablet, and TV. For now, here's the full list of the Disney+ originals that you can already watch in India:

Disney+ Hotstar originals
Diary of a Future President: Season 1, ongoing
Disney Family Sundays: Season 1, ongoing
Disney's Fairy Tale Weddings: Season 2, ongoing
Encore!: Season 1
Forky Asks a Question: Season 1
High School Musical: The Musical: The Series: Season 1
The Imagineering Story: Limited Series
Lady and the Tramp (2019)
Lamp Life
The Mandalorian: Season 1
Marvel's Hero Project: Season 1, ongoing
Noelle
One Day at Disney
One Day at Disney: Season 1, ongoing
Pick of the Litter: Season 1
Pixar in Real Life: Season 1, ongoing
Shop Class: Season 1, ongoing
Short Circuit: Season 1
SparkShorts: Season 1
Timmy Failure: Mistakes Were Made
Togo
The World According to Jeff Goldblum: Season 1

Source: Gadgets360 (NDTV)

 

[Desmond]

How is the pricing?

 

[Cool Buddy]

The changes were rolled back. So as of now, Disney+ is officially not available in India.

However, as the article says, you can still access the shows using the link provided in the article itself. As of now, these can be accessed directly if you have a Hotstar subscription (which I do, and that's how I tried it). So it seems it will come bundled with a Hotstar subscription and there won't be any additional subscription required. It would be great if that were true.

If you want to watch any of these show, but want to use the app instead of the browser (especially if you want to watch it on a TV), you can simply open the link in the browser, log in, and then add the show to your watchlist. It will then show up in your app.

 

[Vyom]

So will the catalog for Disney limited to only those listed in first post?
I think I need to find out the catalogue and whether they would be censoring stuff, to decide whether to go for hotstar subscription.

Edit: Also the points raised in the youtube video (on source article page) are something to consider about.
> Mediocre bitrate and quality which is more apparent when watching sports
> Buggy app
> No profile option

Hotstar is surely not a great streaming service by any means. With the advent of disney+, I hope issues for Hotstar gets fixed somehow.

 

[Cool Buddy]

Hotstar is not that great an app, yes. But it has improved considerably in the last 2 years. When I started using it, it had absolutely no features. You just went and watched shows.

Now it has a watchlist, shows you upcoming episodes for shows you're watching, allows proper seeking, casting, subtitles have improved, and in general, it has become a lot more usable now. Sure there's still room for improvement, it's no Netflix, but I think in another year, it will be almost perfect. They've done good work.

Streaming quality is a whole different arena. Their quality is still only suitable for small screens. I stopped actually streaming content on Hotstar the moment I got a 50" television. It's just unwatchable. I sure hope with the advent of Disney+, they also improve the quality of streaming. Alternatively, they could limit the base plan to 720p and introduce a slightly more expensive 1080p or even 4K plan.