Where can I watch "Yellowstone" in Canada?

Yellowstone, a drama series created by Taylor Sheridan and John Linson and starring Kevin Costner, about a large American cattle ranch that borders a Native American reservation and the namesake national park, premiered on the Paramount Network cable channel on June 20, 2018.

In Canada, the fifth season of Yellowstone will be available solely on the Paramount+ streaming service beginning on Sunday, November 13, 2022, as announced by the service on September 29. We expect episodes to be available during or shortly after their premiere U.S. broadcasts, Sundays at 8:00 p.m. Eastern time.

Paramount+'s Canadian service costs $9.99 per month, or $99.99 per year when billed in a single annual payment, with a seven-day free trial available for first-time subscribers. Subscriptions are available directly from Paramount, as well as through Amazon Prime Video Channels (which requires a subscription to Prime Video, a separate $9.99 per month or $99.00 per year) and Apple TV Channels. (All prices in this article are in Canadian dollars before applicable sales taxes, and were last checked on November 12, 2022 but are subject to change.)

This is a change from past seasons – Yellowstone was not previously available on Paramount+; new episodes instead premiered in Canada on Paramount Network as in the United States, with season 4 also streaming simultaneously on Prime Video Canada.

As far as we can tell, new episodes of Yellowstone will no longer be available on Paramount Network's Canadian feed. While the channel's schedules for November 13 and 20 indicate it will air episodes of Yellowstone on both dates, including at 8:00 p.m. ET, the episode titles indicated are from past seasons. (Feel free to contrast with the schedule for the channel's U.S. feed.)

Episodes from past seasons to date (i.e., seasons 1 to 4) are also available to stream in Canada on Amazon Prime Video, but based on the wording of Paramount+'s announcement, it's unlikely that future seasons will be available with just a subscription to Prime Video. (That said, season 5 is available to those subscribed Paramount+ through Prime Video.)

Why isn't Paramount Network carrying new episodes in Canada anymore?

Paramount Network – previously known as The Nashville Network (TNN), The National Network (also TNN), and Spike TV – remains available in Canada as a permitted foreign channel (still listed under its previous "Spike TV" name).

However, it's gotten increasingly harder to find on Canadian TV service providers. Rogers Cable dropped the channel for the second time in early 2022, after having made some efforts to promote Paramount Network during the fourth season of Yellowstone. The channel had previously lost its two-digit channel positions on Rogers' systems, making it harder to come across when channel surfing.

It probably didn't help matters that many of the programs on the channel's U.S. feed have been increasingly replaced with rerun marathons of other original series like Bar Rescue and Auction Hunters, due to restrictions on the broadcast rights of acquired programs like the movies and Two and a Half Men reruns that air on the American feed.

And our sense is that many more Canadians discovered Yellowstone via its previous Canadian streaming deal on Prime Video than through its linear broadcasts on Paramount Network.

Since parent company Paramount Global (previously known as ViacomCBS) produces and owns the underlying intellectual property to Yellowstone, contractually it could likely continue to air the series on Paramount Network in Canada, alongside Paramount+, especially as the former remains available on some other Canadian providers.

However, given the factors outlined above, the company has evidently decided to bite the bullet on focusing its Canadian efforts on Paramount+ in Canada – which probably generate quite a bit more revenue from streaming subscriptions.

Why didn't Yellowstone arrive on Paramount+ sooner?

The aforementioned Paramount+ (previously known as CBS All Access) is a streaming service owned by Paramount Global (formerly ViacomCBS) – the same company that owns Paramount Network and Paramount Pictures, among other media properties – but it is not the same thing as Paramount Network, and many of the available programs differ between the two services.

While it would have made a lot of sense for Paramount+ to have had streaming rights to Yellowstone sooner, for many years ViacomCBS was quite fickle about how to handle these rights in Canada. It sold Canadian streaming rights to Yellowstone and even a few so-called "Paramount+ original" series like The Stand to Amazon, while holding onto a few others like Infinite and certain South Park specials.

In the U.S., Paramount+ still does not stream Yellowstone, because ViacomCBS had previously sold the streaming rights for that country to NBCUniversal's Peacock service.

However, Paramount+ does have the global streaming rights, including in both the U.S. Canada, to 1883, a spin-off prequel series that premiered on December 18, 2021, and should have rights to any similar spin-off programming going forward.

Significant revisions

• November 12, 2022 – fully updated to reflect changes in Canadian availability for season 5 (previouly noted in an update added in late September)