DAZN Replaces Gotham Sports App as the Exclusive Streaming Home for YES and MSG Networks: What Subscribers Need to Do Before the 2026-27 NBA and NHL Seasons
YES Network and MSG Networks have named DAZN as their exclusive direct-to-consumer streaming home beginning with the 2026-27 NBA and NHL seasons, ending the Gotham Sports App experiment that brought the two networks together as a single app in spring 2024. Current Gotham Sports App users keep uninterrupted access while the migration to DAZN runs through the new season, and pay-TV subscribers who already receive MSG or YES through a cable or satellite bundle will be able to stream the same games on DAZN at no extra cost. The exact cutover date and the pricing tiers for cord-cutters have not been published and are due to be announced in the coming months.
What changed on 29 July 2026
Two regional sports networks in the New York market, YES Network and MSG Networks, told their subscribers and the wider sports media on Tuesday that DAZN will become the exclusive place to stream their games directly to consumers starting with the 2026-27 NBA and NHL campaigns. The Gotham Sports App, which had carried both networks' live feeds since spring 2024, will be wound down as that migration happens, and the joint venture that owned the app will be dissolved as part of the transition. The networks will retain their linear channels; only the streaming side of the direct-to-consumer business moves to DAZN.
The seven-team lineup that has lived on Gotham Sports App since launch is the entire reason the migration matters. Brooklyn Nets, New York Knicks, New York Yankees, New York Rangers, New Jersey Devils, New York Islanders, and Buffalo Sabres games all sit behind the paywall today, and they will all sit behind DAZN's paywall tomorrow. DAZN has confirmed it will carry continuous YES Network, MSG, and MSG Sportsnet feeds, alongside highlights, behind-the-scenes features, and original programming the networks already produce for the linear channels.
The single most important practical point for current subscribers is that the cutover is not happening overnight. Gotham Sports App users are to retain uninterrupted access while YES and MSG migrate them to DAZN during the 2026-27 NBA and NHL seasons, which means the existing login, billing, and viewing experience keep working for the games on the calendar that fall inside the migration window. New subscribers, on the other hand, will sign up through DAZN rather than through the Gotham Sports App from the point DAZN opens the regional subscription, and the Gotham Sports App download page is expected to be retired shortly after that.
What stays the same for the seven-team regional lineup
Every team that has streamed on Gotham Sports App is moving as a group, not in pieces. The Nets and the Knicks carry NBA games. The Rangers, Islanders, Devils, and Sabres carry NHL games. The Yankees carry MLB games, which is the one major-league sport whose season is already underway, and the migration window for those games will sit alongside the rest of the change rather than in front of it. The full list matches what Gotham Sports App has carried since launch, and the migration is not a chance for any of those teams to drop off the regional streaming lineup.
The features that Gotham Sports App users have grown used to will be carried over to DAZN. Continuous feed streaming rather than only marquee games is a structural commitment, not a marketing line, because DAZN has built its global product around always-on regional coverage rather than pick-of-the-week event windows. Subscribers who have been watching pre-game shows, post-game analysis, and condensed replays on the Gotham app should expect the same kind of programming to live inside the DAZN app under the YES and MSG channel tabs.
Pay-TV customers who already receive MSG or YES through a cable, satellite, or vMVPD bundle will not need to pay anything extra to keep streaming the same games on DAZN. The verification path is expected to use the existing pay-TV credentials, the way other regional networks have handled the move from a network-owned app to a third-party streaming home. The free streaming path is the practical reason a fan who never signed up for Gotham Sports App may end up downloading DAZN for the first time, just to use the pay-TV login flow.
The migration window, and what it means in practice
YES Network and MSG Networks have committed to announcing the exact migration timing and additional transition details in the coming months. The 2026-27 NBA regular season starts in the third week of October 2026, and the 2026-27 NHL regular season starts within days of that, so the cutover is expected to land somewhere between the preseason schedule and the opening tip. Anyone who watches a regular-season game on Gotham Sports App today and then tries the same login a week into the NBA or NHL schedule should expect the Gotham app to redirect to the DAZN login screen by the time the migration completes.
The migration is described as a transfer, not a fresh signup. Gotham Sports App account holders who have already paid for the season are to retain their access through DAZN rather than be billed again, and the migration window is the practical mechanism that lets the networks move paying subscribers from one billing system to another without a gap in coverage. Subscribers will see the change in the app they open rather than in the credit-card statement, and the migration window is what the networks are using to make sure that billing hand-off does not collide with an in-progress game.
The window also gives fans time to do the housekeeping that any sports streaming migration usually forces. Devices need to be re-signed-in, parental-control settings need to be reapplied, notification preferences need to be reset, and any saved game highlights or downloaded replays stored inside the Gotham app will not survive the cutover. The original Gotham Sports App, when it was launched, asked subscribers to start from a clean account rather than import a YES or MSG app profile, and the reverse migration is expected to follow the same pattern: a clean start inside DAZN, with billing carried across.
What pay-TV subscribers and cord-cutters actually need to do
For a pay-TV subscriber who already receives MSG or YES through a cable, satellite, or vMVPD bundle, the move to DAZN is essentially a download and a login. The bundle entitlement transfers as a verification step inside the DAZN app, the same way other regional sports networks have handled a network-owned app moving to a third-party home. Once the verification completes, the bundle subscriber sees the same games they have always watched on the linear channel, with the additional option to stream on phones, tablets, and connected TVs through DAZN.
For a cord-cutter who has no pay-TV bundle, the practical question is the price of the regional subscription on DAZN, and that number has not been published yet. Gotham Sports App subscription plans had started at roughly $209.99 per year for the lower tier, and the migration to DAZN is widely expected to keep the regional lineup in the same kind of pricing band, but neither DAZN nor the networks have confirmed a final number. The pricing announcement is part of the same "coming months" timeline as the migration timing, and the two are likely to land together.
For anyone planning to install a streaming app for the first time, the DAZN app is published on the standard iOS App Store and Google Play routes, and the regional subscription unlocks the YES and MSG feeds once the migration goes live. The install, sign-in, and verification flow inside DAZN follows the same pattern as most streaming apps, and fans who already have a DAZN account for international soccer, boxing, or other sports will simply add the regional tier rather than create a fresh account. Existing Gotham Sports App account holders are the one group that has to wait for the migration window to open rather than sign up directly.
Why the Gotham experiment is ending after two seasons
The Gotham Sports App launched in spring 2024 through Gotham Advanced Media and Entertainment, the joint venture MSG and YES formed to share a single streaming app rather than run two competing apps in the same market. At launch, the joint venture was positioned as the most efficient way to handle the seven-team regional lineup, since fans in the New York market had spent the previous two seasons juggling the separate YES and MSG apps. The unified app made sense in theory, but the practical experience of running a streaming operation is expensive, and the regional rights environment has changed enough since 2024 that the joint venture is no longer the cheapest path forward.
The wider US regional sports market has been reshaped by Main Street Sports, the former owner of MLB, NBA, and NHL regional sports networks, which shut down in spring 2026 after a bankruptcy filing. The Main Street shutdown removed one of the larger third-party operators from the regional market and pushed a meaningful share of the remaining streaming rights back onto the league-owned and team-owned networks. YES and MSG, having watched that consolidation play out, have decided to outsource the streaming side of their regional business to DAZN rather than rebuild the Gotham Sports App on top of the new market structure.
DAZN, for its part, has spent the last several years building out regional streaming infrastructure across multiple countries, and the YES and MSG migration gives it its first seven-team US regional portfolio. The deal is a structural win for DAZN's North American footprint, and it gives the networks a partner that already runs the technical side of live sports streaming at scale. The Gotham Advanced Media and Entertainment joint venture is being wound down as part of the same transaction, which is the corporate signal that the two networks will no longer share a streaming layer once the migration completes.
What to watch in the coming months
The next concrete announcements from YES, MSG, and DAZN will be the regional subscription price for cord-cutters and the exact migration date for current Gotham Sports App users. Both are expected before the 2026-27 NBA preseason begins in early October, and the migration window is the practical deadline for the announcement. Anyone watching the regional sports market will also be reading the same announcements for clues about whether other US regional networks follow the same playbook and migrate to a third-party streamer rather than run a network-owned app.
For fans inside the New York market, the second concrete development will be how the pay-TV verification flow works inside DAZN, since the verification is the moment a bundle subscriber actually moves from the Gotham app to the DAZN app. The earlier verification works on the first attempt, the smoother the migration window feels, and DAZN's track record on pay-TV verification in other markets is the practical benchmark for how the US rollout will go. The migration is also the moment the seven-team regional lineup stops being a Gotham Sports App story and starts being a DAZN story.
For ongoing reading on sports streaming migrations, regional network changes, and how new apps fit into a regular sports-watching routine, the khelomoreindia.com blog covers the next regional-rights development when it lands.