Love Island – A “Good Chat” About Watching The Show

It might not have bested the critics’ cynical eyes but Love Island is one of the UK’s biggest entertainment exports, having made its way into 22 different countries to date. The show, which has a Big Brother-style format, albeit in a villa in Spain, pits pairs of contestants against each other in a battle of love and betrayal. Anyone who winds up single is voted out of the house. For viewers outside of the UK, it’s obviously not possible to watch Love Island as it was intended to be viewed, namely on ITV, from a sofa on a rainy British estate. Don’t fret, though. Both the original version and several international spin-offs are available to watch in North America and large parts of Europe. A graphic created by ExpressVPN managed to find nine such Love Islands, including the British version.

As an added bonus, ExpressVPN has created a bingo card for the show that includes Island-isms like “put all my eggs in one basket”, “good chat”, and “where’s your head at?”. The idea is that you cross out a box and take a sip of something every time one of the contestants utters one of these soundbites. As with many other TV bingo games, the card is designed for fun viewing parties.

Of course, a Love Island party requires the show itself. In the USA, you can get your fix of holiday romance from three different providers – Paramount+, Hulu, and CBS, via their website. Love Island USA and Australia are available in their entirety on these platforms but watching the UK version aren’t quite as straightforward. Hulu has all the UK episodes but Paramount+ users only have a handful of seasons to choose from. 

This latter split is due to licensing regulations surrounding the show’s broadcast. Oddly enough, it’s not just a problem overseas. Plenty of BBC and ITV shows can only be found in fragments even on native shores, as the pair of broadcasters try to push viewers towards their own shared platform, BritBox. TV lovers will probably have multiple streaming accounts already so it’s easy to feel a little chagrined by these business decisions. 

Due to its French-speaking population, Canada actually has more Love Island variants to choose from. Love Island UK, Australia, and USA can all be watched on Hayu. The US version is split between CTV and Hayu, though, with the former carrying all the episodes. Francophones and Francophiles can catch L’île de l’amour on the Canadian TVA network, too – if you happen to live in Montréal.

So, what about India? Season 8 of Love Island UK streamed on Lionsgate Play during the summer of 2022. The show has been particularly popular on the Subcontinent due to similarities with the Indian reality series Splitsvilla, which has aired since 2008. Love Island (all varieties) and Splitsvilla both use the same template to create drama between the contestants. 

The Parrot Analytics website claims that Love Island UK ranks well above the local average for audience numbers in India, with demand at 4.6 times higher than most other TV shows shown here. This places it in the top 8.6% of all productions in the country. The same source adds that Love Island UK is the most popular reality series currently available in India.

Love Island UK will reportedly head to South Africa in 2023, while continuing to keep a permanent base in Mallorca, Spain.