You may have noticed that you cannot watch Discovery Plus in NZ. If you go on the app or website, you’ll come across an error stating, “discovery+ is not yet available in this location.”
This is happening because Discovery does not have the rights to broadcast its content in NZ.
To watch Discovery Plus in NZ, you need to make the streaming service think you’re watching it from within the US, where it does have the rights to broadcast its content.
The easiest way to do this is with a reliable VPN.
In this article, I’ll show you how to get a VPN that will work with Discovery Plus, and I’ll also explain how you can use this VPN to watch Discovery Plus in NZ or anywhere in the world.
See also:
Discovery Plus not working with VPN? Try these SIMPLE fixes! (August 2021)
How to watch Discovery Plus in NZ: Quick Guide
To make Discovery Plus think you’re watching from within the US, you need a US IP address.
The easiest way to get one is by using a reliable VPN. All you need to do is follow these simple steps:
Create a new account with ExpressVPN ($6.67/month)
Download and install the new VPN app
Select a server in the US
Create an account with Discovery Plus (more on this below)
Watch Discovery Plus in NZ
How to create a Discovery Plus account in NZ?
To create a Discovery Plus account, you need a US address. This is easy to get around.
All you need to do is Google “US postal address,” select an address and use that information to fill out your account details. It’s simple.
It’s also important to make sure you use an active email account when signing up because you’ll be sent a confirmation email to finalise the creation of your Discovery Plus account.
Why is Discovery Plus blocked in NZ?
The reason Discovery Plus is blocked in NZ is because it doesn’t have the rights to broadcast its content in Aotearoa. The copyright and licensing agreements it has with its content partners stipulate that the content cannot be accessed in NZ.
Discovery Plus is a US streaming service that only has the rights to broadcast its content in the US.
If Discovery made its streaming service available in a country where it didn’t have broadcast rights, it could face severe financial repercussions.
To protect itself from these potential copyright and licensing issues, Discovery Plus uses geo-blocking techniques to prevent anyone outside of the US from accessing its service.
These blocks are the reason you’re running into the “discovery+ is not yet available in this location” error when connecting to Discovery Plus in NZ.
How does Discovery Plus block my connection?
The way Discovery Plus blocks your connection is all to do with your IP address.
When you go online, you’re allocated a unique IP address. Like an area code on a landline phone number, this IP contains information about where you’re physically located.
When you connect to Discovery Plus, the streaming service scans your IP address to determine your location.
If it finds you are outside of the US (in NZ), it blocks you from accessing its content.
How do I get around Discovery Plus’s geo-blocks?
To get around Discovery Plus’s blocks, you need to fool it into thinking you’re accessing its service from inside its broadcast zone.
To put it simply, you need to make it think you’re in the US. To do this, you need a US IP address.
The easiest way to get a US IP address is with a VPN.
When you use a VPN to get a US IP address, Discovery Plus will scan your IP and think you’re in the US.
Now, Discovery Plus will be unblocked, and you’ll no longer run into the “discovery+ is not yet available in this location” error.
How do VPNs work?
A VPN is perfect for watching Discovery Plus in NZ because it does two things. First, it gives you an anonymous internet connection so your location cannot be ascertained by Discovery Plus, and secondly, it will provide you with an IP address in a country of your choosing (provided the VPN has a server in that country.)
It does this by encrypting all of your internet data and rerouting it through one of its servers (that you can choose).
Once your data reaches this server, it’s decrypted and sent to an internet service provider based in the country where the VPN server is located.
This all sounds very complicated, but all you have to do is download ExpressVPN ($6.67/month) or Private Internet Access ($2.03/month), connect to a US server, and you’ll be able to watch Discovery Plus anywhere in the world.
Does Discovery Plus block VPNs?
Yes, Discovery Plus tries to block VPNs; however it cannot block them in their entirety, only the IP addresses they provide.
Discovery Plus does this by monitoring for an abnormal amount of connections coming from the same IP address, where abnormal means more than an average household. Usually, only 7-10 devices connect to Discovery Plus via the same IP address. More than this, Discovery deems as abnormal usage.
This can be a problem for VPNs because, in order to be profitable, they need to have more customers than IP addresses.
The problem with this business model is it forces customers to share IP addresses.
The sharing of these IPs makes it easy for Discovery to identify abnormal usage because hundreds or thousands of connections connect to the streaming service via the same IP address.
When Discovery Plus sees this, it knows this is a VPN IP address, and it blocks it.
Don’t panic, though. There are two very good VPNs that can get around this issue. See below:
What VPNs work with Discovery Plus?
The VPNs that work with Discovery Plus are the ones that can stay one step ahead of Discovery Plus’s VPN blocking techniques.
ExpressVPN ($6.67/month) or Private Internet Access ($2.03/month) are very good at doing this.
First, they have a lot of IP addresses, so the chance of you sharing an IP with another customer is much less than other VPNs. Also, most importantly, when Discovery Plus blocks an IP address provided by these VPNs, ExpressVPN ($6.67/month) or Private Internet Access ($2.03/month) will close that IP address and open a new one.
This allows you to stay one step ahead of Discovery Plus’s blocks, and it means you can watch Discovery Plus in NZ or anywhere in the world reliably.
The best VPNs to watch Discovery Plus in NZ
1. ExpressVPN 🥇
Why You Should Use ExpressVPN? It’s the fastest and MOST reliable VPN of 2022
Pros
- ✅ Fast servers
- ✅ Thousands of IP addresses
- ✅ 10-simultaneous connections
- ✅ 24/7 Live Chat
- ✅ Easy-to-use app
- ✅ 30-day money-back guarantee
Cons
- ❌ Expensive
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Number of servers: 3,000+ | Speed: >80% | Bandwidth: Unlimited | IP locations: 160 in 94 countries | Devices supported: 5 | Live chat: Yes | 30-day money-back guarantee: Yes
- $6.66/month for 15 months
- $9.99/month for 6 months
- $12.95/month for 1 month
ExpressVPN ($6.66/month) is still the best VPN. And importantly, it ALWAYS has servers that are open with major streaming sites such as Netflix, BBC iPlayer, Hulu, Disney+, HBO Max, Paramount+, Amazon Prime Video, etc.
ExpressVPN is usually very good at playing Cat and Mouse with online streaming sites. Meaning, whenever one of its servers is blacklisted it creates a new one – giving its users a constant stream of servers that aren’t blocked. Needless to say, this is a valuable attribute if you’re looking for a VPN to unblock streaming sites.
Its app is easy-to-use and free to download on pretty much any device you can think of. Mac, Windows, iOS, Android, FireStick, Android TV, Roku, PS4, Xbox, Linux, even Apple TV (with a workaround). It’s got it all covered.
The app is another main reason this VPN is so good at unblocking TV streaming sites (that claim they block VPNs) is that its software takes a pragmatic approach to user management. While other VPNs tempt customers by promising them access to hundreds/thousands of servers in multiple countries, ExpressVPN does things differently.
With ExpressVPN you only have a handful of server locations to choose from. Once you select your location the app takes care of the rest. Assigning you to the fastest available server that’s not oversubscribed. This simple technique is so important, as it keeps ExpressVPN’s servers operating at lightning-fast speeds and prevents its IPs from getting blacklisted for “abnormal” usage in the first place.
Check out our full ExpressVPN review.
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2. Private Internet Access 🥈
The BEST low-cost VPN for streaming!
Pros
- ✅ Fast and reliable servers
- ✅ Thousands of IP addresses
- ✅ 10-simultaneous connections
- ✅ 24/7 Live Chat
- ✅ 30-day money-back guarantee
Cons
- ❌ Only 48 server locations
Special Offer for you!
Sign up for a 3-year plan with Private Internet Access and save 83% + 3 months free. That works out at $2.03/month.
Number of servers: 25,000+ | Speed: >75% | Bandwidth: Unlimited | IP locations: 70 in 74 countries | Devices supported: 10 | Live chat: Yes | 30-day money-back guarantee: Yes
- $2.03/month for 3 years
- $7.50/month for 6 months
- $11.99/month for 1 month
Private Internet Access is one of the leading no-log VPN services with over 1-million paying customers.
This VPN is one of the best in the industry at beating streaming sites’ VPN bans. It provides reliable connections with US Netflix, BBC iPlayer, Hulu, HBO Max, Disney+ Amazon Prime Video, etc. It also allows 10 simultaneous devices to be connected to its servers at the same time, so you can share the account with your close friends.
If – for whatever reason – you’re not happy with Private Internet Access, there’s a 24/7 live chat support available to assist you with your problem. PIA also offers the industry-standard 30-day money-back guarantee.
From my tests (from New Zealand) I was able to get download speeds of 70 Mbps while connected to a UK server using the Private Internet Access VPN (my non-VPN speed is 100 Mbps).
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3. NordVPN 🥉
A very quick and trustworthy VPN
Pros
- ✅ Fast servers
- ✅ No logs
- ✅ Thousands of IP addresses
- ✅ 6-simultaneous connections
- ✅ 30-day money-back guarantee
- ✅ Easy-to-use app
Cons
- ❌ No refunds for purchases from iTunes/App store
Special Offer for you!
Sign up for a 3-year plan with Private Internet Access and save 83% + 3 months free. That works out at $2.03/month.
Number of servers: 5,000+ | Speeds: >80% | Bandwidth: Unlimited | IP locations: 62 countries | Devices supported: 6 | Live chat: Yes | 30-day money-back guarantee: Yes
- $3.49/month for 2 years
- $6.99/month for 1 year
- $11.95/month for 1 month
NordVPN is the most widely-used VPN in the world. And it’s easy to see why. It’s a polished app that delivers fast connections (more on this later) to a massive network of VPN servers.
It’s the most reliable at unblocking popular streaming services too – US Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, BBC iPlayer, HBO Max, Amazon Prime Video, etc. This is because NordVPN hired a full-time technical team (that’s responsible for monitoring its servers’ connections with popular TV streaming services) and has been aggressively investing in its network of IP addresses in key locations.
Another interesting thing to note is that NordVPN is an industry leader in its development of Nordlynx technology. Nordlynx is built using the WireGuard, a new VPN tunneling protocol designed to outperform current standards (OpenVPN and IPSec). The benefits, according to NordVPN, are dramatically faster transfer speeds while connected to a VPN. My tests – New Zealand to London – confirm that Nordlynx is currently the fastest VPN on the market. However, the difference isn’t dramatic, a few Mbps is all.
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4. Ivacy
A very quick and trustworthy VPN
Pros
- ✅ Fast servers
- ✅ Thousands of IP addresses
- ✅ Dedicated streaming servers
- ✅ 5-simultaneous connections
- ✅ 30-day money-back guarantee
- ✅ 24/7 Live Chat
Cons
- ❌ Only 5 devices
- ❌ Sometimes runs slow
- ❌ Occasionally block by streaming sites for several days
Special Offer for you!
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Number of servers: 1,000+ | Speed: >65% | Bandwidth: Unlimited | IP locations: 275 in 100 countries | Devices supported: 5 | Live chat: Yes | 30-day money-back guarantee: Yes
- $1.16/month for 5 years
- $3.50/month for 1 year
- $9.99/month for 1 month
If you’re looking for an excellent VPN, with an even better price tag, Ivacy ($1.16/month) is a great option.
This VPN has all the features you need to stream BBC iPlayer, in HD, from any country in the world. I’ve been testing the app recently on Mac, PC, Android, iOS and FireStick and the results have been impressive – unlocking BBC iPlayer, US Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, HBO Max, Amazon Prime Video, etc. with ease.
The Ivacy app is a little different in regards to its UX (user experience). Instead of just selecting a UK server, you need to select the specific BBC iPlayer server. Don’t worry, this isn’t a bad thing – by connecting to a dedicated BBC iPlayer server, it simply means that you’re connecting to an IP address that Ivacy knows works with BBC iPlayer.
For an extra $1.99/month (£1.74) you can add-on a dedicated IP. This will buy you sole access to an IP address in a country of your choice, meaning you won’t have to share your IP (and speeds) with any other use. I don’t recommend this though, using the regular Ivacy servers is enough 95 per cent of the time.
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5. CyberGhost
A very quick and trustworthy VPN
Pros
- ✅ 1-day free trial
- ✅ Reliable servers
- ✅ Thousands of IP addresses
- ✅ 7-simultaneous connections
- ✅ 30-day money-back guarantee
- ✅ Easy-to-use app
Cons
- ❌ Expensive
- ❌ Average speed scores
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Number of servers: 1,000+ | Speed: >65% | Bandwidth: Unlimited | IP locations: 275 in 100 countries | Devices supported: 5 | Live chat: Yes | 30-day money-back guarantee: Yes
- $2.75/month for 3 years
- $3.69/month for 2 years
- $5.99/month for 1 year
- $12.99/month for 1 month
CyberGhost is one of the more established VPNs on the market. It has a well-established, and well-tested global network of servers that perform well.
From my tests over the past several months, CyberGhost has no trouble at unblocking major streaming services – US Netflix, BBC iPlayer, Hulu, Disney+, Amazon Prime Video, HBO Max etc. This VPN performed well at maintaining download speeds, well above 65 per cent of my regular (non VPN) ISP speed.
That said, there’s nothing really unique about the service. Which forces you to look at its price-point. And there’s nothing special here. Its short-term $12.99/month price tag puts is well above the industry average of $10.10/month. Similarly, its long-term $2.75/month for 3 years deal isn’t much of a “deal” either.
Oddly, CyberGhost’s most unique feature is its a 1-day, no obligations, free trial. This is an appealing offer to customers who are new to VPNs. However, it’s important to remember that most reputable VPNs will offer customers a 30-day money-back guarantee, so try not to be too seduced by the offer.
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