DirecTV Reviews: what to look for before you order

With over 15 million subscribers and a solid track record, you’ll find generally positive DirecTV reviews across the web. Overall, DirecTV customer satisfaction trends upwards when it comes to sports, DVR and general programming. Recent negative reviews have focused around the brand and tech stagnation since AT&T acquired it a few years back. Now that AT&T has given day-to-day control of the company back to DirecTV, things are gradually getting back on track. Let’s take a closer look at how DirecTV’s ratings can and should affect your thought-process before ordering…

DirecTV’s BBB Scores

DirecTV’s BBB Rating: A-

BBB ratings, while somewhat antiquated, still do a good job of gauging how well the company responds to customer issues. A good BBB rating doesn’t necessarily mean overall reviews are great, just that the company quickly attempts to resolve problems posted on the site. As of publication, DirecTV has an A- rating. That means when someone posts an issue with their current or previous DirecTV service, DirecTV addresses it right away. The outcome isn’t always to the satisfaction of the subscriber but the company gets points for trying.

DirecTV’s BBB Customer Review Rating: 1 ouf of 5

DirecTV currently has over 250 customer reviews on BBB — the overall, aggregate score of those reviews is 1.1 out of 5 stars. Not good but keep in mind disgruntled customers are way more likely to post on BBB than happy ones. Most of the recent complaints involve issues after the AT&T merger (often billing or contractual problems).

For context, DISH’s BBB score and customer review ratings are: A, 1.1/5 (680+ reviews). Netflix’s BBB: A+, 1.1/5 (135+ reviews)

So, don’t put too much stock into lower BBB customer scores — the BBB letter grade gives you a better idea of how responsive a company is (steer clear of well-known companies with BBB ratings of less than C).

JD Power & Associates

One of the more respected customer analysis firms around, JD Power routinely gets a feel for satisfaction rates for cable, internet, TV and other home services. Over the past decade, both DirecTV and DISH have routinely out-scored cable TV. As streaming has become a bigger player, they’ve generally scored just as well as satellite (of course, there are better and worse streaming options, so it’s somewhat spread out).

Back to the traditional cable TV and satellite firms, here’s the latest summary from JP Power’s analysis in 2021. Interestingly, they broke up the scores by region (scores are based on a 1,000 point scale):

• Verizon ranks highest in the East segment with a score of 750, followed by DISH (747) and DIRECTV (742)
• DISH ranks highest in the North Central segment with a score of 746, followed by AT&T (735) and Xfinity (717)
• AT&T ranks highest in the South segment with a score of 762, followed by DISH (760) and DIRECTV (742)
• DISH ranks highest in the West segment with a score of 744, followed by AT&T (734) and DIRECTV (721)
• Nationally, DISH ranks highest with a score of 751, followed by DIRECTV (731) and Xfinity (723)

Keep in mind this includes all the big players in cable and satellite TV — only the top 3 in each region make the grade. So, overall, this continues the previous trend that Direct TV (and DISH) out-rank just about all cable companies. And, in general, DISH has slightly better customer satisfaction scores than DirectTV.

So, what’s this all mean?

Bottom line, DirecTV does a good job of keeping customers happy. They definitely took a hit to subscriber count and reputation when AT&T acquired them. That was clear in the complaints about AT&T and how they incorporated DirecTV. Now that DirecTV is back as a standalone firm (free to advertise on their own, re-grow their own tech, etc) we’re hearing way more positive feedback from visitors to our site… and the same is slowly being reflected online.

Over the past couple decades, Direct TV built a fun and tech savvy brand that had a very loyal following. Fortunately, they’re back and we expect them to re-assume their place as a leading provider of TV and DVR (Genie) entertainment and programming. With regard to DirecTV’s reviews, both off- and online, they’re back to trending upwards. And, while they’ll likely never outpace DISH, they’re solid enough to justify switching if you’re a fan of DirecTV’s main advantages over competitors: NFL Sunday Ticket, sports, HBO bundles and its Genie DVR.

About the author

George Levint

George is the senior editor at DigitalFind and an expert in how technology at home impacts our lives. From funky analog radios to AI devices that try to out-think you, he's usually unfairly critical until proven otherwise. He also enjoys spending the occasional weekend off-grid to keep Skynet guessing.