Reseller guide
How to Test an IPTV Service Before Buying: 7 Checks That Matter
A trial is not a demo. It is your due diligence, and you get one shot at it before you commit money to credits. Test these seven things in this order.
1. Peak hours, not quiet hours
A stream at 11am tells you nothing. Test between 7pm and 11pm in the country you sell to, on a weekday and again on a weekend. Almost every stability problem only appears under load.
2. The channels your customers actually want
Not the channel count. Nobody has ever cancelled because a provider had 18,000 channels instead of 22,000. Pick the ten channels your target customers care about and check every one of them, twice, on different days.
3. Start-up time
Time how long a channel takes to load, and how long it takes to switch between two channels. Anything over three seconds will generate support messages forever. This is the single best predictor of how much support work you are signing up for.
4. VOD and series library
Open the on-demand section. Check whether titles actually play, whether audio tracks and subtitles exist, and whether the library looks maintained or abandoned. A stale library is a sign of how much attention the whole service gets.
5. The programme guide
An accurate EPG is invisible when it works and a constant complaint when it does not. Check that the guide is populated for your main channels, in the right time zone, at least two days ahead.
6. Device coverage
Test on the exact device model your customers use, not the one you own. A service can be flawless on a phone and unusable on a five-year-old smart TV. If you sell to a mixed market, test the oldest device in it.
7. Support response time
Send a support message during the trial and time the reply. This is your future escalation path. If it takes eleven hours to answer a pre-sale question, imagine the answer speed once you are a customer with a problem at 9pm on a Sunday.
Run all seven and you will know within 48 hours whether a provider is worth building a business on. Skip them, buy a large credit block, and you will find out the slow and expensive way.