It's a daunting thing, navigating that Roku interface to find a quality title to watch next amid the streamer's seemingly unending array of options. That very breadth is what makes the Roku Channel one of the best free streaming services around and a great way to enjoy free TV shows and movies online.
The channel's selection of media is forever changing, with new content being added monthly and joining the tens of thousands of movies and series already available, all free to watch thanks to the support of periodic ads.
The Roku Channel is available on all Roku devices, as well as on select Samsung TVs, Amazon Fire TV devices and web browsers at TheRokuChannel.com, which makes it very convenient and foolproof to kick off with a great show.
To help you sort through that sprawling selection of series, here is a trio of free TV shows we recommend watching on the Roku Channel, including a horror classic, a crime drama and a BBC miniseries.
'The Equalizer'
Sadly, the Queen Latifah-led thriller "The Equalizer" was recently canceled by CBS after five seasons, but that now means that the entire series is up for a binge-watch on The Roku Channel.
A reboot of the 1985 series of the same name, the crime drama sees the multihyphenate Latifah star as Robyn McCall, a divorced single mother and former CIA operative with a mysterious background who uses her extensive skills to help those with nowhere else to turn.
The first episode aired after the 2021 Super Bowl and scored more than 20 million live viewers, and though future ratings never quite repeated those highs, the series was certainly popular enough to have a solid 74-episode run across four years.
Latifah's lead performance was particularly praised: the critical consensus on Rotten Tomatoes reads, "Queen Latifah returns to the small screen in full command of her craft—if only 'The Equalizer's' overly-engineered early episodes were on her level."
Watch on the Roku Channel
'Little Women'
Louisa May Alcott's classic coming-of-age drama — which centers on four sisters as they embark on the journey from youth to adulthood during the American Civil War — has served as the source material of many a big-screen adaptation over the years, from Gillian Armstrong's 1994 drama starring Winona Ryder and Claire Danes to Greta Gerwig's 2019 masterpiece led by Saoirse Ronan and Florence Pugh.
But one of the loveliest versions of Alcott's beloved tale was actually made for the small screen: the 2017 BBC miniseries "Little Women", with Maya Hawke, Willa Fitzgerald, Kathryn Newton and Annes Elwy playing the plucky March sisters.
Told over three one-hour episodes, the Heidi Thomas-adapted, Vanessa Caswill-directed series "offers a charming, intimate, and decidedly loyal adaptation of Louisa May Alcott's original story," per Rotten Tomatoes' critical consensus.
Watch on the Roku Channel
'Alfred Hitchcock Presents'
If it's a good spine-chilling thriller you're after, you can't go wrong going to the Master of Suspense himself. Yes, "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" — the groundbreaking television series from famed horror filmmaker Alfred Hitchcock ("Psycho", "The Birds"), which was voted as one of "The 100 Best TV Shows of All-Time" by Time magazine — is available to stream for free on The Roku Channel.
Running for 10 seasons from 1955 to 1965, each installment of the creepy anthology began with that iconic title sequence (featuring a caricature drawing of a man in profile and Gounod's "Funeral March of a Marionette") before segueing into a hair-raising story of terror and suspense.
Stand-out episodes include "Lamb To The Slaughter", "Man With A Problem", "Bang! You're Dead" and, arguably the most famous of them all, "Man from the South" written by Roald Dahl and starring Steve McQueen and Peter Lorre.
Watch on the Roku Channel
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