I have a number of active streaming services at any given time (some of which rotate throughout the year). Between the shows Meghan and I like to watch and the shows the kids like to watch, I don’t always know where to find the show or movie that any of us are trying to find.
Plus, this is an all-too-common song and dance: someone recommends a show, I open Netflix, it’s not there. Try Hulu. Not there either. Watch on Disney+. No. It’s at the point now where I’ll put the title in a note and maybe remember to look it up later. Or maybe not.
This happens enough, so I built something to fix it. First as a web app (which I already talked about), and now as a real iOS app.
Everything about Where can I watch? For iOS
Where can I look? is a free iOS app that answers one question: where is this movie or show streaming?
You search for a title and the app tells you exactly what services it has, whether it’s included in a subscription, available to rent or buy.
That’s it. No accounts, no subscriptions, no ads. Only the answer.
What it does
More details and screenshots are available in the app homepagebut here’s the gist of the set of functions:
- Search everything. Type in a movie or TV show and get instant results. With each result, you’ll see the streaming services that offer it right in the search results before you even tap it.
- Tap for full view. Tapping on a title gives you everything: seasons, episodes, overview, and a full overview of where you can stream, rent, or buy the title.
- Your services, highlighted. The app allows you to select which streaming services you subscribe to. When you search for something, the results are adjusted to show what’s available your services first. This alone has kept me from renting things that I could have watched for free on a service I was already paying for.
- Watchlist with countdowns. Save movies and shows to your watch list. For TV shows you get countdown badges (Tomorrow, 2d, 1 week), so you always know when the next episode will be broadcast. The app will send you a notification on the broadcast day, so you don’t have to keep checking.
- Popular. Browse what’s trending daily in movies and TV. I’ve found a handful of shows this way that I would never have encountered otherwise.
Get it
Where can I look? is free in the App Store. No in-app purchases, no premium tier, no catches.
Requires iOS 17.0 or later. Streaming availability data covers the United States.
I have a backlog of things I’m already working on for the next version (some features and some fixes) and I’ll continue to provide updates here as they roll out.
Under the hood
If you’re curious about the technical side, here’s what’s in it:
The app is built with SwiftUI And SwiftDatatargeting Swift 6 with strict concurrency. I went with one based on actors caching and data management architecture. It works like this: SearchCache, ProviderCacheAnd SharedDataStore are all actors, which made the simultaneity story much cleaner than trying to sprinkle it on @MainActor everywhere.
All streaming data comes from the TMDB API.
The project uses XcodeGen for generating projects, which has been worth all the setup time. No more merge conflicts .xcodeprojno more Xcode doing mysterious things to my project file. Just one project.yml And xcodegen generate. Sometimes dealing with the CLI is much easier than a heavier IDE.
There is one widget (built with WidgetKit) with recent watchlist items, synced via app groups and SharedDataStore. And notifications are handled with local planning. Currently, the app checks broadcast information daily and schedules notifications at 9am on broadcast dates.
If you have any questions about any of the technical choices or encounter any problems with the app, please feel free to contact us.
#iOS #Tom #McFarlin