How to Watch The Handmaid’s Tale in 2020

The Handmaid’s Tale has to be one of the more interesting shows to hit streaming platforms in recent memory. The dystopian drama has received countless awards for acting, special effects, cinematography and more. If you’re hungry for brooding drama with heavy religious and political undertones — we know, enticing — we’re here to help.

In this guide on how to watch The Handmaid’s Tale, we’re going to give you every way you can stream the show online. Some methods are paid and others are free. Some are legal and others not so much. Regardless of the size of your pocketbook, though, we have a way for you to watch The Handmaid’s Tale.

Watch The Handmaid’s Tale Online

Accessibility isn’t difficult when it comes to The Handmaid’s Tale. The show is produced by Hulu, and like most streaming platforms, it releases all episodes of a particular season at once (much like Netflix does with Black Mirror). Hulu isn’t too expensive, either, at least if you’re willing to put up with ads.

In this case, going the legit route isn’t too bad. Hulu is cheap, and by streaming it there, you’ll be able to ensure that you get a 4K stream. That said, that isn’t possible for everyone. Hulu is only available in the U.S. thanks to the rigorous geoblocks put in place by networks such as NBC. If you’re outside the U.S., you’re out of luck.

Our best VPN for Hulu guide can help, though. A virtual private network masks your internet connection to make it appear as though you’re in another location. When using one, you can be anywhere in the world and still seem like you’re in the U.S. to Hulu.

If you want to watch The Handmaid’s Tale, you need two things: an active Hulu subscription and to be located in the U.S. Thankfully, a VPN can take the latter requirement away if you don’t live in the U.S.

Watch The Handmaid’s Tale for Free

Though inexpensive, Hulu still costs something. Fret not, though, because there are ways to stream it for free. The most direct route is Couchtuner, which has both seasons of The Handmaid’s Tale. There are other streaming websites, as well, but we had the best luck with Couchtuner.

Don’t just run off and start streaming, though. Going to any website that’s infringing on copyright laws is a good way to get malware. Before firing up, protect yourself from potential threats with the best antivirus software. We recommend Bitdefender because it can protect your machine in real time from any cybercrime hitching a ride on your stream (read our Bitdefender review).

Using a VPN wouldn’t hurt, either. Bitdefender has its own, but as you can see in our Bitdefender VPN review, it’s not that great. You’ll do better with any of the options from our best VPN guide, but if you’re not interested in reading a few thousand words on VPNs, you can read our ExpressVPN review instead.

The VPN will shield your IP address from anyone who wants to snoop on your connection. When using a VPN and antivirus, you’ll not only be protected from malware on the website, but also anyone who wants to find out where you are. Plus, these websites aren’t legal, so if you want to avoid a letter from your internet service provider, you need to hide what you’re doing.

Watch The Handmaid’s Tale on Kodi

If you don’t want to sit at your desk and watch The Handmaid’s Tale, you can use Kodi. The setup can be complicated, though, so make sure to read our Kodi guide if you’re unfamiliar with the platform. In short, it’s a front-end media center that allows you to organize media stored on your network.

Many unofficial add-ons for Kodi allow you to stream movies and TV shows for free. A lot of them have episodes of The Handmaid’s Tale — you can read our best Kodi add-ons guide to see which ones — but we recommend Exodus. If you want to learn how to install it, make sure to read the aforementioned guide.

The legality of Kodi is complicated. You can read our is Kodi legal guide for specifics, but the gist of it is that any copyrighted material is generally a no-no. We feel like we’re beating a dead horse, but the way around such legal blocks is a VPN.

You can set up Kodi and start streaming without a VPN, but it isn’t a good idea. Each time you request to stream an episode, your IP address and, as such, your online identity, is sent along with it. Anyone who sees that information, including your ISP and law enforcement agencies, will know what you’re doing.

Read our best VPN for Kodi guide to get up to speed. We like ExpressVPN for Kodi, too, but NordVPN is a solid, budget-focused alternative (read our NordVPN review).

Watch The Handmaid’s Tale Torrent

Lastly, you can torrent The Handmaid’s Tale. A quick search on popular torrent websites — we’re sure you can guess which ones — shows that all episodes from seasons one and two are available for download. If you’re unfamiliar with how torrenting works, read our what is torrenting guide.

Unsurprisingly, there are legal concerns with torrenting, too. Our is torrenting illegal guide attempts to clear up the gray area it deals in, but regardless, you should be using a VPN here, too. Our best VPN for torrenting list is a good place to start.

ExpressVPN is solid for torrenting, but we like NordVPN more because of its dedicated peer-to-peer servers. CyberGhost has torrenting servers, too, but as you can see in our CyberGhost review, the speeds are disappointing.

Even more so than when streaming online, an antivirus is essential when you’re torrenting. When downloading through a magnet link, there’s no way to tell what the torrent file contains, meaning you can’t know what you’re putting on your machine. As long as you’re using the most secure antivirus software, though, you’re fine.

Bitdefender takes the crown for that, but there are other options if it doesn’t tickle your fancy. F-Secure is, as the name implies, secure, but it’s costly as you can see in our F-Secure Antivirus review. Kaspersky Anti-Virus consistently ranks well in lab results, but there are concerns about it when it comes to user privacy (read our Kaspersky Anti-Virus review).

Final Thoughts

There are multiple routes to watch The Handmaid’s Tale. No matter which you’re taking, though, a VPN will come in handy.

Our streaming archive should be helpful, too. There, you can find other articles like this one for streaming the latest movies and TV shows around the web. Recently, we put up how to watch Dragon Ball and how to watch Black Panther, so check those out.

How are you watching The Handmaid’s Tale? Let us know in the comments below and, as always, thanks for reading.