The Habs in French or English: IPTV for Montréal Homes

Vous préférez lire en français? Notre page IPTV à Montréal couvre les mêmes sujets pour les foyers francophones.

Which channel has the Canadiens in French, and which in English?

It depends on two things: the language you want and whether the game is regional or national. The 2026–27 season is the first under new deals on both sides, so last year’s habits may send you to the wrong channel.

Here’s what changed. Bell renewed its regional deal with the team, so RDS and TSN 2 keep the Canadiens, but RDS gets fewer games than before. On the national side, Rogers holds the NHL’s Canadian rights from this season through 2037–38 and announced on September 3 a 12-year French-language sublicence with Quebecor, which puts national French games on TVA Sports. In English, CBC no longer carries NHL games, and Sportsnet’s Saturday Night Hockey took over the Saturday slot on October 3.

Most home games at the Centre Bell start at 7 p.m., and Montréal is on Eastern Time, so there’s no conversion to do. One date to circle: the Heritage Classic, an outdoor game against the Jets in Winnipeg on October 25. The official Canadiens schedule lists every date; the TV guide in your app shows the channel once you’re signed in.

What else is on for Montréal sports fans?

• Alouettes (CFL). Games at Percival Molson Memorial Stadium air on RDS in French and TSN in English. The Grey Cup is on November 15 in Calgary, on CTV, TSN and RDS.
• CF Montréal (MLS). Home at Saputo Stadium. Every MLS match streams on Apple TV in 2026, not on a Canadian channel, which matters if soccer is your main reason for watching.
• Montréal Victoire (PWHL). The new season starts December 5, and that night the Victoire face the expansion PWHL Hamilton team in the first of eight PWHL games that CBC will air under the Hockey Night in Canada name. The league’s Canadian partners also include ICI Radio-Canada Télé, Sportsnet, TSN and RDS.
• Laval Rocket (AHL). The Canadiens’ farm team; RDS carries its home games.
• FC Supra du Québec (CPL). The Canadian Premier League’s newest club played its first season in 2026 at Stade Boréale in Laval.

If you split your evenings between RDS and TVA Sports, RDS 2 is worth knowing too: it’s RDS’s second channel, often used when two events overlap.

Do Vidéotron, Bell and Fizz lines work for IPTV?

All three work. The difference that matters is how the line is built, because that tells you where to look when a game stutters.

If your Habs game stalls at the same time every evening even with the TV plugged in, our guide to fixing stream interruptions during NHL games in Ontario and Quebec walks through the tests to run and what to tell your provider.

Why do plexes make Wi-Fi harder?

A Montréal duplex or triplex stacks two or three households on top of each other, often in long, narrow flats where the router sits by the front door and the TV is three rooms back. Brick and plaster walls, a kitchen in the middle and neighbours’ routers above and below all eat signal. In the Plateau, Rosemont or Villeray, it’s common for a phone to see two dozen networks.

1. Move the router toward the middle of the flat. Even a longer cable from the wall jack to a shelf in the hallway helps.
2. Connect the TV device on 5 GHz. If your Vidéotron or Bell modem shows one network name for every band, look for the option to split them and give 5 GHz its own name.
3. Wire it when you can. A flat Ethernet cable along the baseboard, or MoCA adapters over the coax cable many plexes already have, gets the TV off the crowded air.

Our Wi-Fi vs Ethernet guide shows how to measure the difference in your own flat before you buy anything.

What happens on moving day?

Your IPTV Rich login moves with you. Around July 1, when a large share of Montréal changes address on the same weekend, internet installers get booked up, so book Vidéotron, Bell or Fizz well ahead. Your subscription isn’t tied to an address or a provider: once the new flat has internet, sign in on the same device and you’re watching. If the new line isn’t ready yet, a phone hotspot can carry an SD stream at about 3 Mbps, though it uses roughly 0.7 GB an hour.

Full package or English-only in Montréal?

Most Montréal households should choose Full. It includes the French channels: RDS, RDS 2, TVA Sports, TVA, Noovo, ICI Radio-Canada Télé, Télé-Québec, and the news channels LCN and RDI. The English-only package is built around English channels, so it suits a home that watches the Habs on TSN 2 and the news on CTV and never switches language.

The Full package also adds international channels, which matters in a city where many families watch in a third language: Arabic in Saint-Laurent and Ahuntsic, Haitian Creole in Montréal-Nord, Italian in Saint-Léonard, Greek and Punjabi in Parc-Extension, Spanish, Vietnamese, Mandarin and Portuguese across the island. We don’t promise a specific channel from a specific country, since international line-ups change, so search for the channel you care about during the trial. The city publishes neighbourhood census data on its open data portal if you’re curious about your own borough.

For a closer look at what’s in French, our guide to French-language channels for Quebec viewers goes through RDS, TVA, Noovo and the rest.

Where do you get Montréal news?

In French, TVA, Noovo and ICI Radio-Canada Télé carry the local evening newscasts, while LCN and RDI run news all day. In English, the Montréal stations of CTV, Global and Citytv, plus CBC, cover the city, with CBC News Network and CTV News Channel for national stories. Catch-up on supported channels lets you go back to the six o’clock news after a long day. Station feeds can change, so if one newscast matters to you, find it in the guide during your trial.

Is IPTV Rich right for you in Montréal?

It fits a household that wants both languages, the Canadiens, the Alouettes and international channels in one TV guide, and would rather pay once than sign a contract. It isn’t the right call if:

• You already get RDS and TVA Sports through your Vidéotron or Bell TV package and you’re happy with it. Switching only makes sense if you want to drop that bill.
• CF Montréal is all you watch. MLS is on Apple TV in 2026.
• Your flat can’t hold 5 Mbps on the TV in the evening. Fix the Wi-Fi first, or IPTV will frustrate you on game night.

Support works in English and French by live chat, every day from 9 a.m. to midnight Eastern, which is Montréal time. You can start the 24-hour free trial there and test it on a real Canadiens night.

How much is it, and how do you pay?

The same price as anywhere in Canada. One device for one month is $17, and 12 months on one device is $77. A home that wants RDS in the living room and TSN 2 in the basement at the same time needs the 2-device plan: $28 for a month or $128 for a year. You pay once by Interac e-Transfer from your own bank app, whether that’s Desjardins, National Bank or any other Canadian bank, and nothing renews by itself. The full list is on our IPTV subscription prices page, and the IPTV Canada home page covers what’s included.

Following the Canadiens from outside the island? Our Québec City page covers French-first viewing in the capital, the Ottawa page covers Gatineau-side Senators fans, and the Toronto page is there for the rivalry. Every city is on the IPTV near me hub.