The Sunday NFL broadcasts are the main feature of American sports viewing. Week 4 was supposed to feature the Los Angeles Chargers versus the New York Giants on CBS, but many viewers got a very different experience entirely.

The Anchorage was plagued by technical difficulties. Instead of the Chargers-Giants game, the CBS stream kept glitching. Suddenly, fans found themselves watching the Washington Commanders vs the Atlanta Falcons game instead.

The fans were bewildered to see different matchups without warning, some even replayed moments before they actually happened, thanks to lagging streams. Meanwhile, the official CBS message only offered, “An error has occurred, but we’re working on fixing it. We’ll be up and running again shortly!”

This fiasco echoed another incident just seven days earlier during NBC’s Sunday Night Football, which faced glitches, including garbled video and frozen telestrator screens during critical plays.

NFL Premium+ streams blew the Paramount+ feed out of the water, with some replays showing up twice before the live event happened. The fans even pointed out that if you don’t pay for Sunday Ticket, forget catching the game on CBS smoothly. It was a messy evening full of buffer, confusion, and rattled fans. Definitely not what Sunday night football should look like.

CBS’s current NFL partnership is a multi-billion-dollar, long-term deal extended through 2033. The network, alongside its parent company Paramount Global, aims to dominate both traditional broadcasts and streaming platforms like Paramount+ by offering NFL games across devices.

Sean McManus, chairman of CBS Sports, explained, “Watch the NFL on CBS however you want.” But these glitches throw a wrench in that vision, shaking viewer trust in the network’s ability to deliver smooth coverage during crucial moments. Fans were confused and frustrated, flooding social media to vent their annoyance.

NFL fans slam CBS Week 4 stream

One viewer complained, “CBS latency is abysmal. We’re talking like a full minute delay at times.” That delay strikes at the heart of why CBS and Paramount+ have poured billions into NFL streaming rights. These games are key to attracting new subscribers and keeping the ones they already have hooked. But these glitches tear down the very promise CBS Sports sells.

Another asked, “Hey CBS, wtf is WAS-ATL doing on my screen???” There were plenty of complaints about how the games switched mid-stream, ruining the immersive NFL experience everybody craves.

Few subscribers pointed out the bitter irony that, without Sunday Ticket, an expensive subscription, reliable access to CBS’s NFL broadcasts remains shaky at best. “What is wrong with CBS? Unless a person pays for the SundayTicket you can’t even watch NFL Football on CBS. This Sunday 9/28/25 the NY Giants vs LA Chargers was constantly interrupted with a scattered screen. The game would suddenly switch to another game on CBS.”

With highly anticipated matchups lined up in the upcoming weeks, the pressure mounts on CBS to fix these issues fast. Those games represent not just big audiences but growing digital demand across streaming devices. If CBS cannot patch the technical problems, viewers may start looking elsewhere for their football fix.