Amazon Prime Instant Video Offline Viewing

If you're like most cord cutters you've already signed up for one of the various streaming services.  All of them have their advantages.  Certain exclusive rights to particular shows, original content, and types of programming are all considerations when signing up for one.  However Amazon Prime offers by far the largest amount of benefits with it's service.  While not streaming service in the conventional sense, Amazon includes many perks for it's subscribers streaming video included.  Recently they took this service to a whole new level by offering offline viewing.

Anyone who has ever tried to watch a movie or TV show on the go knows the potential problems involved.  First of all if you aren't on a solid Wi-Fi connection you need to use mobile data to stream the content.  This is usually fine until you go into an area with sketchy reception.  The other major downside is that HD quality content uses a lot of data, and if your package limits the amount you have, or throttles your usage you're probably in for a headache one way or the other.  Offline viewing solves those problems by allowing you to download the video to your device and watch without an internet connection. This page can give you the run down of how to set up your device to utilize this service.

Keep in mind that using your device for viewing video content causes the screen to run constantly thus increasing the speed at which the battery will drain.   Obviously you can just plug your device in using the typical charger, but here at CCC we're big fans of external battery packs.  We have several and they have paid off greatly while spending lots of time away from usual power sources. The most important thing to consider when using one is how big its battery is vs. the one in your device. 

The other thing to consider is memory usage.  When we experimented with this the video filed saved to the device memory instead of the micro SD card we had installed. This can cause the device to run more slowly, so be on the lookout.  You can mitigate the effects by choosing a lower quality video setting to download but it's up to you.

We've used this service to watch several shows, including Amazon's original series Bosch while on the go, and it's worked quite well.  All in all it's another fine service that's included with Amazon Prime, and certainly one to add to the list of Pros if you're considering signing up even if it's only for the trial membership.