How to watch The Undeclared War: Stream the cyber-thriller series in the UK, US and abroad
Shadowy enemies, deeply laid conspiracies and chaos on the streets of London – The Undeclared War makes for a tense and thrilling watch
Set in an imagined 2024 in the run up to a general election, The Undeclared War follows a team of analysts at Government Communications Headquarters, who must ward off an escalating series of cyber attacks on Britain.
While viewers in the UK may have missed this series’ live airing on Channel 4, never fear, as catching up is simple. The Undeclared War can currently be streamed for free by anyone with an All4 account, while Sky TV subscribers can stream it with ease from the Sky Go app. Meanwhile, TV fans in the US eager to see Britain engaged in a high-tech battle for survival (well, not too eager, we hope) can watch the series in full from 18 August on the streaming service Peacock.
If you’re a subscriber to any of these services who fancies streaming The Undeclared War from abroad, should you find yourself on a holiday or business trip with some time to kill, your best bet is to sign up to a high-quality VPN service. Two of our favourites, ExpressVPN and NordVPN, are reviewed briefly at the bottom of this page, and will allow you to stream The Undeclared War from anywhere in the world.
What is The Undeclared War about?
Tapping into a range of modern anxieties about election fraud, cyber-security and the ability to trust what’s in front of our eyes, The Undeclared War sets up a thrilling narrative, following Saara Parvin, a young intern at GCHQ whose first day on the job coincides with a major cyber attack on the UK. To prove her trustworthiness and protect her country, Saara goes beyond the remit of her orders, investigating the attack more deeply and uncovering the first strands of a conspiracy that is to put the upcoming election, and the future safety of the UK, at risk. Throughout, the series follows Saara and the crack team of analysts at GCHQ as they attempt to battle this shadowy cyber-threat in secret, and deal with the fallout once this foreign power’s ability to influence and damage Britain’s infrastructure and integrity becomes increasingly visible to the public.
If that’s not enough to draw you in, The Undeclared War also has an impressive and talented team behind it. The show is led by newcomer and soon-to-be-star Hannah Khalique-Brown as Saara, with established names like Simon Pegg (Hot Fuzz, Mission Impossible Franchise), and Mark Rylance (Bridge of Spies, Dunkirk) rounding out the main cast. Behind the camera, writer and director Peter Kominsky is best known for his Emmy-winning adaptation of best-selling novel Wolf Hall.
READ NEXT: What’s new on Sky and NOW this month
How to watch The Undeclared War in the UK: All 4 and Sky Go
As we’re sure viewers will be happy to hear, you won’t have to engage in any feats of hacking or cyber warfare to watch The Undeclared War in the UK. The show is available to stream for free on All4 – all you have to do is sign up for an account by entering an email address and password.
If you’re a current or prospective Sky TV customer, you’ll be able to catch up on The Undeclared War – as well as other popular TV series and movies, such as Spiderman: No Way home and Westworld – on the Sky Go app. Sky TV bundles start from as low as £26, with the entry-level bundle giving you access to Sky TV and Netflix. Sky TV also gives you access to US streaming service Peacock, as we delineate in more detail below.
How to watch The Undeclared War in the US: Peacock
NBCUniversal’s streaming platform Peacock boasts plenty of top TV shows and movies, including The Office (US), This is Us, 1917, the John Wick franchise, and much more. With the six-episode series debuting on the service on 18 August, it is now also the US home of The Undeclared War. If you’re looking to sign up, Peacock’s Premium tier is surprisingly cheap at only $4.99/month, with a year-long subscription, costing $49.99/year, saving you 17% compared to paying month by month.
If you’re in the UK but fancy the look of this line-up, you’ll be interested to know that Sky TV and NOW customers can access Peacock in the UK for free on a dedicated app accessible via Sky Q, Sky Go, Sky Glass, or your NOW Entertainment membership.
How to watch The Undeclared War anywhere in the world: Use a VPN
A VPN, or Virtual Private Network, is a useful service for anyone wanting to stream region-locked content. Should you find yourself outside the US or UK (on holiday, say) and wanting to access sites like All4 or Peacock, a VPN is probably your best option.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with VPNs, you may want to check out our full VPN explainer, but in short, a VPN is a tool which creates a secure, anonymous connection between your device and the web at large. This prevents anyone, including your Internet Service Provider, government, as well as nefarious entities such as scammers and hackers, from snooping through your browsing activity or exploiting your data. A VPN achieves this privacy and secure anonymity by encrypting your data as well as by rerouting your traffic through a number of servers across the world. It is this rerouting, also known as ‘location spoofing,’ that allows you to access geo-blocked sites, as noted above.
A quickly growing industry, there are new VPN services launching almost every week. That being said, not all of them are safe, reliable or easy to use. With an overwhelming array of options to choose from, we’ve simplified things by summarising two of our favourites below:
ExpressVPN is a longstanding favourite of ours and picked up five stars and a coveted Best Buy award in our full length ExpressVPN review. It’s notable for its strong privacy and security credentials, with the company being based in the British Virgin Islands and operating an independently audited no-logs policy to prove that your data isn’t being logged in any fashion. In testing, ExpressVPN allowed us to stream multiple 4K videos from stateside servers, which its excellent location spoofing abilities allowed us to access. Express operates a 30-day money-back guarantee, and Expert Reviews readers can enjoy an extra three months for free via the link below.
Another favourite here at Expert Reviews, NordVPN also scooped up top marks and a Best Buy Award in our full-length NordVPN review, not to mention being named our top VPN overall in our Best VPN selection. NordVPN operates a similarly audited no-logs policy to ExpressVPN, and also sits outside the remit of the Five Eyes Alliances, thanks to the company being registered in Panama. Signing up to NordVPN gives you access to over 5,500 servers strewn across 59 countries, providing you with a huge range of options when it comes to location spoofing. Outside of that, NordVPN offers top tier streaming and download speeds, as well as 24/7 customer support, which is a rare and useful feature, given the technical and sometimes complex nature of using a VPN.