Best DVR for cord cutters 2020

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Best DVR for cord cutters 2020

Here’s the hard truth for cord-cutters right now: The ideal over-the-air DVR doesn’t exist.

While some products are better than others, all of them—from Tablo to TiVo to HDHomeRun with Plex—have at least one critical weakness. If you want to record broadcast TV channels from an antenna, you must decide which of those weaknesses you’ll tolerate.

The good news is that the lowly antenna is experiencing a rebirth, and we’re likely to see even more over-the-air DVR products. But if you want to start recording broadcast channels now, here’s a rundown of where the current products stand.

Updated September 2, 2020 to add our review of the latest iteration of Channels DVR. This software is as expensive as ever, but there’s no better over-the-air DVR on the market, and it’s our new top recommendation for power users. 

[ Further reading: The best media streaming devices ]

The best OTA DVR for most cord-cutters

If you don’t need four over-the-air tuners, the Tablo Dual Lite DVR—our previous top pick in this category—remains a compelling value. The Tablo Quad DVR is slightly more expensive, but it makes the fewest trade-offs and of any product in this class. We do have a few nits to pick—interlaced video can’t play back at 60 frames per second, and there’s a limited number of streaming boxes you can use for out-of-home viewing—but in a field that doesn’t include the perfect OTA DVR, the Tablo Quad DVR comes the closest.

Runner-up

There’s a lot to like here, especially for cord-cutters who have made Fire TV devices their media streamers of choice, but there are also enough shortcomings to limit the Fire TV Recast  (which is available in both 75- and 150-hour SKUs) to our runner-up pick in this category.

hardware.

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