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New Year’s Eve 2021 NYC Ball Drop: How To Watch The Times Square Countdown

NYE ball drop
MEGA
Evening Writer

The New Year’s Eve ball drop in Times Square will be virtual for the first time in its 114-year history. Watch it go down here, and learn where else you can watch the countdown!

This year, you won’t experience FOMO by watching the New Year’s Eve ball drop in New York City’s Times Square from your computer. That’s because just about everyone has to due to the pandemic, which has forced Times Square to turn away the public on New Year’s Eve for the first time since 1907 (the first year the ball dropped). But the show must go on — virtually, that is. You can watch a livestream of the ball drop right below on Dec. 31st, OR read on for more details on other fun ways you can watch the ball drop at midnight.

If you want to experience an even more intense version of the ball drop and the festivities leading up to it, head to this website — vnye.com — which will give you the option of watching the live broadcast of the New Year’s Eve celebration in Times Square from your laptop, or on the vnye app for your iPhone or Samsung. The website will offer multiple cameras for you to choose from: the main live show, the ball cam (which is what you’re looking for), the uptown cam, the times square cam, the countdown and downtown cam, the audience 1 cam, the audience 2 cam, the audience 3 cam and the world feed. All of these cameras will start streaming on Dec. 31 at 6:00 p.m. EST.

You don’t need to wait for Dec. 31st, though, to kick-start your NYE festivities. The vnye.com website (offered by Jamestown, which owns One Times Square where the ball drop celebration is annually held) has also constructed a virtual world that opened to online participants on Dec. 19. You can even play games and complete quests in this world!

You can also watch a webcast here on timessquareball.net, which starts on Dec. 31 at 3:00 p.m. EST. The main page of the website even offers a virtual countdown to help you keep track of when you should start counting down: “3…2…1!”

Of course, you can go the traditional route by counting down as the ball drops in NYC on your television. Just turn the channel to one of the major networks: ABC, FOX, CNN or NBC. Each network will have its own special NYE broadcast, which will all end with the grand finale of the ball countdown and drop. ABC is airing Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2021; FOX is airing New Year’s Eve with Steve Harvey; CNN is airing New Year’s Eve Live with Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen; NBC is airing NBC’s New Year’s Eve 2021. All these networks have apps (ABC Live, FOX Now, CNNgo and the basic NBC app) that you can watch these broadcasts on from your cellphone, too.

Just because the ball drop celebration is virtual this year, doesn’t mean it’ll be any less special! Nearly 200 Waterford Crystals were installed into the ball before the 2021 celebration, and an exciting lineup of performers have been announced including Andra Day, Jennifer Lopez, Machine Gun Kelly, Billy Porter and more! Stay tuned for HollywoodLife‘s coverage of the New Year’s Eve 2021 celebrations in Times Square.