Showmax is running a 3 months for the price of 1 promotion

With Netflix on the verge of cracking down on password sharing, you might want to look into ShowMax instead. There are plenty of reasons why it might be a better option than Netflix. For example, they are not in cahoots with our Finance Minister so no VAT is collected when you pay for their service, you can still share the account with a friend as long as you stick to the two device streaming at the same time limit and there is plenty of African content in there.

Then there is the promotion. Until the end of March Showmax, will be running a 3 for 1 promotion. This means that if you pay for one month which costs R99 you will be able to watch for two more months without paying. Normally 3 months of standard Showmax would set you back R297. So if you take advantage of the promotion you will be able to save almost R200 or thereabout.

But here is the catch: the Showmax 3 for 1 promotion is for subscribers in Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda, and South Africa only. The pessimist in you must have known-nothing good ever happens on our side of the border. I mean when was the last time we actually had a price decrease and I am not referring to those fairy tales we read about on the pages of State media.

DStv has had similar promotions in the past and a few blessed Zimbabweans have actually received phone calls asking them to take advantage of these promotions. But during my four-year stint as a DStv customer, I was never fortunate enough to receive the tap. My friend who was asked to rejoin in exchange for a free month had to go through hoops to actually get that free month as DStv cut him off demanding payment.

You can still take advantage of the offer

All is not lost, however, and you can still take advantage of the offer. First off as already pointed out, the promotion is exclusive to certain territories, and so all you need to do is make sure your Showmax account is South African (being the closest country in the promotion to us).

That’s a bit tricky because while Showmax uses either you payment method and or your IP to determine the account linked to your country. If you use PayPal to pay for example you set up a billing agreement and during the set up process PayPal sends back your country of residence back to Showmax which is then used as your account of residence in Showmax.

If you use a debit card like FBC’s MasterCard Showmax uses your current IP address to determine you country of residence. If you are on a Zimbabwean IP your fate is sealed, your account will be forever Zimbabwean.

You can however create a South African account if you take the following steps:

• Make sure Showmax sees your South African IP address. For example, with ZOL Wibroniks you must turnoff IPV6 and experiment until various IP information services start showing you in South Africa. A VPN will not work as they are blacklisted, Showmax is just as good as Netflix when it comes to unearthing proxies too. SmartDNSProxy will also work.
• Pay using either a voucher which you can have someone in South Africa purchase for you. Online voucher shops are geo-locked and will only take South African payment methods when selling electronic vouchers so:
  • Either have someone buy the voucher in shops like PEP and Checkers for you or
  • Have someone with a South African bank account or card buy for you
• You can then redeem the voucher in your account under payment methods
• You can also pay using MTN or Vodacom airtime

What to watch on Showmax this weekend

ShowMax’s library is nowhere near as extensive as Netflix’s but they do have plenty of content. Unfortunately, this promotion doesn’t extend to ShowMax Pro. ShowMax Pro allows you to stream EPL and Laliga matches as well as cricket and other live sporting events. However there are some good gems in there.

If you are into Telenovelas you can watch:

1. The Queen
2. The River
3. Legacy

The Queen on Showmax

There is plenty of local content there but there is more. If it’s on DStv it’s probably on ShowMax too. There are HBO shows like Game of Thrones and shows from a host of other networks:

• Game of Thrones
• Warrior 2019
• Watchmen
• Prison Break 911 Lone Star and others