Last Week Tonight with John Oliver is now streaming (for free) on YouTube

Last Week Tonight with John Oliver has been on the air for over a decade, but it's still finding new ways to attract viewers. The talk show recently made its first season available to stream on YouTube, and the best part is that it's completely free! No more tricky cable sign-ins or workarounds: you can simply open YouTube and laugh at Oliver's rants.

The revelation came about on X (formerly Twitter), and served as a condolence prize for the fact that there wasn't a new episode of Last Week Tonight. “There’s no new episode this week! But we still have current events," the official account wrote. "From 10 years ago. This Sunday we’ll be dropping all of season 1 for free on YouTube!"

Last Week Tonight season 1 is on YouTube

It was a clever concept, and one that will become a normal practice for Last Week Tonight. The X account announced that the next bulk of seasons will be made available the next time there isn't a new episode.

The announcement also came with the withering acknowledgment that some of the jokes made a decade ago are still applicable today:

"Seasons 2-8 to come, whenever we don’t have a new episode. Trust us, some of this is still completely relevant. Some."

Seasons 2-8 will eventually be added

The rollout of Last Week Tonight with John Oliver is something that HBO executives have been figuring out for the last year. The show would originally release episodes on YouTube the day after it aired, but the decision was made to delay its release in an effort to boost ratings.

"We are delaying that availability and hope those fans choose to watch the entire show on Max," the platform said in a written statement. While it's unfortunate that fans will have to wait to watch the newest episodes on YouTube, we will at least be able to catch up on the show's back catalog.