How to watch Atlanta season 4: Stream the final season of FX’s hit comedy-drama from anywhere in the world
One of the definitive shows of the last ten years, here’s how you can watch the last episodes of Atlanta in the US, UK or elsewhere
Wait a second, you might say, didn’t I just watch the new season of Atlanta? And you’d be right to be a little confused: season 3 of Atlanta aired relatively recently, back in March 2022. With the massive gaps between seasons of TV we’ve become accustomed to due to the rigours of the streaming industry and the Coronavirus pandemic, we were all caught a little off guard when it was announced that Donald Glover’s Emmy and Golden Globe winning dark comedy was returning for its fourth and final season just six months after season 3 first aired.
Filmed back-to-back with the third season to help get the show finished in a timely manner, season 4 of Atlanta will premiere on US TV channel FX, kicking off with a two episode double-bill on 15 September, at 10pm ET. After this, the 10 episode season will continue with weekly episode drops in the same time slot. Statesiders looking to stream the show can catch it live via Hulu with Live TV, or the day after it airs with a regular Hulu subscription. Britons will be able to stream it on Disney Plus at some point after its initial US run, with the first three seasons currently available on the service. If you’re a Hulu subscriber likely to find yourself outside of the US during this time, you can sign up for a quality VPN service, such as ExpressVPN, which should allow you to stream the show from anywhere in the world.
What is Atlanta about?
The show follows Princeton dropout Earnest ‘Earn’ Marks (Donald Glover) as he attempts to navigate the Atlanta rap scene and manage his rapper cousin, Alfred ‘Paperboi’ Mies (Brian Tyree Henry), to success, while also maintaining his strained, on-again-off-again relationship with Van (Zazie Beetz), who is also the mother of his child. Though this may sound fairly grounded and straightforward, the show regularly features strange characters and surreal detours, with Glover’s initial mission statement for the show being that he wanted to capture the oddness of Atlanta’s hip-hop scene and make ‘Twin Peaks with rappers.’ Throughout its three season run the show has received near-universal praise and acclaim for its strong performances, offbeat comedy and skewering of US race and class relations.
While the first two seasons dealt with Earn, Paperboi and offbeat friend Darius’ (Lakieth Stanfield) unsteady rise to prominence, Season 3 found the main trio at the top of the game, dealing with the newfound problems of fame and success as they toured across Europe. The third season also introduced self-contained Twilight Zone-esque anthology episodes, which divided opinion among fans – while plenty of people enjoyed these explorations of other characters and concepts, many were disappointed that the main plotline didn’t get more attention. Based on the trailer, season 4 seems to be taking the show back to its roots, with the main cast reunited and seemingly back in Atlanta.
If you’re intrigued but are after more signs of the show’s quality, you need only look at the frankly wild levels of success the main cast and crew have all achieved since its debut in 2016. Creator Donald Glover has appeared in Spiderman: Homecoming, starred as Lando Calrissian and Simba in Solo: A Star Wars Story and The Lion King (2019) respectively, directed his debut feature in which he co-starred with Rihanna, and has an upcoming starring role in a TV adaptation of Mr. and Mrs. Smith alongside Fleabag creator Phoebe Waller-Bridge. Brian Tyree Henry delivered standout performances in quality dramas such as Widows and If Beale Street Could Talk, as well as working his way into two big-ticket cinematic universes: appearing in Marvel’s Eternals and the Monsterverses’s Godzilla vs. Kong.
Lakeith Stanfield has become a critical darling, working with top-tier directors on movies such as Get Out, Uncut Gems, Judas and the Black Messiah, Knives Out, and Sorry to Bother You. Zazie Beetz has popped up in prominent roles in superhero flicks Deadpool 2 and Joker, as well as indie dramas Dead Pigs and High Flying Bird and newly released blockbuster Bullet Train. Frequent Glover-collaborator and episode director, Hiro Murai has gone on to direct episodes of HBO hits Barry and Station Eleven, as well as serving as an executive producer on Hulu’s chef drama The Bear.
How to watch Atlanta in the UK: Disney Plus
While we don’t have an official UK release date for season 4 yet, we can be sure it will make its way onto the service eventually, as Hulu content has been part of Disney Plus UK for some time now. With the show set to finish airing in the US sometime in November, we can probably expect to stream it on Disney Plus in the UK in late November or early December. For now, you can catch up on the first three seasons, as well as boatloads of other content, with a Disney Plus subscription, which will set you back £7.99/mth or £79.90/yr (an annual subscription will save you roughly 15% compared to paying month to month). To keep abreast of what’s new on the streaming service, you can always check out our regularly updated What’s New on Disney Plus page.
How to watch Atlanta in the US: FX and Hulu
As mentioned in our intro above, Atlanta will be airing on US station FX, starting on 15 September with a two-episode special, with the remaining eight episodes airing weekly thereafter. If you’re someone who likes to be fully up to date on everything as it drops, you’ll either have to get a cable package which gives you access to FX, or sign up to Hulu with Live TV, a special streaming bundle which comes with all the regular benefits of Hulu as well as a host of live, on-demand channels, and costs $79.99/mth.
However, if you’re willing to wait till the day after its initial airing, you can catch Atlanta streaming weekly with a regular, less pricey Hulu subscription. The US-exclusive streaming service, which hosts a wide range of hit TV shows and movies such as It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and recently released Predator prequel Prey, costs $6.99\mth, or $69.99/yr, for its ad-supported tier, and $12.99/mth for the ad-free version. If you’re a fan of sports, Star Wars or just want a larger streaming library at your disposal, it may be worth your while looking into Hulu’s bundle deal which includes Disney Plus and ESPN+ alongside its regular streaming content. This content-laden bundle is priced at $13.99/mth with ads, and $19.99/mth for commercial free streaming.
How to watch Atlanta anywhere in the world: Sign up to a VPN service
A VPN, or Virtual Private Network, is a handy tool for anyone looking to stream geo-blocked content, should they happen to be out of the country and want to access, for example, Hulu’s US library to watch Atlanta, or Disney Plus UK to do the same. For those of you who are unfamiliar, a VPN creates a secure and private connection between your PC or phone and the wider internet. This can prevent everyone, including your ISP, the government, as well as hackers and scammers, from sifting through your browsing activity. A VPN obfuscates your browsing by employing encryption as well as redirecting your traffic through one or more servers in a different location, and its this location spoofing which allows you to access region-locked content, as mentioned above. For a more in-depth guide to VPNs, read our full explainer on what a VPN is.
With an ever growing array of options available, and only a precious few of them worth your time and money, we’ve made it simple and narrowed it down to our top two picks below:
ExpressVPN is a favourite here at Expert Reviews, having received five stars and a Best Buy award in full length ExpressVPN review and garnered plenty of praise in our Best VPN round-up. When compared to its competitors, it is among the best on privacy and security, being based in the British Virgin Islands, beyond the jurisdiction of the Five Eyes Alliance, and operating an independently audited no-logs policy, which means you can know for sure that they’re not storing your precious data. It’s capable of streaming multiple 4K videos from US servers without breaking a sweat and excels at location spoofing, allowing us to access said videos on US sites such as Hulu and Disney Plus US.
Another favourite around these parts, NordVPN was named our overall favourite in our best VPN guide and also picked up a Best Buy award and top marks in our full-length NordVPN review. Privacy-wise, NordVPN also operates an audited no-logs policy, and manages to operate outside of US, UK and EU law thanks to its base of operations being in Panama. The service boasts over 5,000 servers dotted around 59 countries, providing top-drawer spoofing options to match its superb speeds for downloads and streaming. A standout feature amongst VPN services, NordVPN also offers 24/7 customer support should you run into any bugs or hiccups when browsing.