There are only so many hours in the day, so why would you want to spend any of them bored? Sure, there is a time and a place for some peace and quiet when you can pick up a good book and relax. But some people would much rather watch the movie or TV series that the book is based on than do that.
Whichever way you land on the never-ending “is the book or the movie better” debate, you have plenty of ways that you can find the movie. In this day and age of streaming, some movies and TV series are only available in certain places while others are available on multiple platforms. Many of the time, you have to pay for the ability to watch whatever you want. There are plenty of free streaming options out there that give you a wide variety of movies and TV series to view. One that you might not know that you have access to is Kanopy, which only requires a library card to use.
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Kanopy is based on what your library has to offer
It’s easy to set up an account
Anybody who has a library card has an opportunity to use Kanopy. There needs to be a reciprocating offer from your library to work with Kanopy. Not every library offers streaming on Kanopy.
The first thing you need to do to start off with Kanopy is have a library card. You can either have a public one or you can be a college student or professor with access to a school’s library. If you have either of those, you’ll be able to search for your school or your library.
If your library or school has a corresponding partnership with Kanopy, you’ll be able to create an account. This gives you access to the system and lets you see what titles you have access to, all of which are free.
What you have access to depends on your library’s subscription to Kanopy. Hoopla is similar in that aspect. You will get access to whichever titles your library subscribes to. For example, my library has a large subscription library to British content from the BBC, giving me access to titles I otherwise wouldn’t have access to.
My library offers unlimited free streaming each month, so there are no set limits. Many libraries have an agreement with Kanopy that includes a ticket system, meaning users get a set number of tickets to use each month. Each title is worth a certain number of tickets, making users ration out their tickets, which reset at the beginning of every month. There are also 0 Ticket Titles.
The Kanopy system is simple to use
Depending on your library, it could be robust
Credit: Chris Hachey / MakeUseOf
As you’re exploring your access, you can see what movies and series you can stream. Kanopy works with all kinds of gadgets and devices, as you need to either be able to use a browser or the dedicated Kanopy app. You can watch Kanopy on these devices:
- iPhones (iOS 14 and newer)
- iPads (iPadOS 14 and newer)
- Android smartphones (7.1+ and newer)
- Android tablets (7.1+ and newer)
- Amazon Fire tablets (FireOS6+)
- Browsers (Chrome, Firefox, Safari, Edge)
- Streaming devices or smart TV OS (Roku, Tizen, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, Google TV, Telstra TV)
Either at the top of your browser or in the menu of the app, you can search for all kinds of titles. You can type in and search for something or you can look at the different categories that Kanopy has laid out.
Similar to platforms like Prime Video or Netflix, Kanopy offers unique categories as well as a standard mix of genres. You can get comedies, dramas, horror movies, and others. But you’ll also get interesting options like Powerful Stories / Powerful Voices, Road Trip Films, Nostalgic TV, Arthouse Favorites, Family Movie Night, and more.
More about the content that you’ll find
It’s all free and available to you
Credit: Chris Hachey / MakeUseOf
If you find content that you want to watch, but just not at that moment, you can add it to your watchlist. This will store all the titles that you want to come back to at a later time.
You can also go back to the titles that you’ve started and continue watching them. Kanopy stores the shows and movies that you’ve started to make it easy for you to come back and rewatch.
I personally have enjoyed using Kanopy because it gives me access to movies and shows that I normally don’t find on other streaming services. As mentioned, my library has offerings for many British series and movies that I haven’t seen before. There is also a large variety of foreign and cult movies that I have access to.
There’s a strong surplus of independent films that I appreciate being able to seek out movies with smaller distributions that I might have missed in theaters. Options like A Quiet Passion, Neptune Frost, Loving Vincent, and A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night are just some of the movies I’ve been able to enjoy on Kanopy.
I also like that I can see what other people are watching because of the fact that Kanopy offers categories that show what is popular that month. There is also a section for new additions, so I can see what else my library has subscribed to or what was added to the original subscriptions. It’s an easy way to enjoy a unique collection of titles for free.
Kanopy is free and available to almost anyone
The fact that I have a library card makes me feel a bit more powerful because of the ability to use Kanopy. I get access to a unique blend of shows and movies through my library’s subscription with Kanopy. This is an easy-to-use, underrated free streaming service and the platform can be watched on all types of devices. It’s a free alternative to the paid subscription services I have, making it possibly more valuable.
