House of the Dragon India release time is set at 6:30am IST every Monday

House of the Dragon is set to premiere at the end of this week – and Disney+ Hotstar has now confirmed that the Game of Thrones prequel will debut at the same time as it does in the US. Starting August 22, new episodes air every Monday at 6:30 a.m. IST on the platform, with no delays to the HBO Max release. The 10-episode series is based on the novel “Fire and Blood” by author George RR Martin and is set centuries before the events of A Song of Fire and Ice.

Each episode of House of the Dragon airs weekly on Mondays, with the first season set to end October 24 with episode 10. While this schedule is the same for most HBO releases on Disney+ Hotstar, the big change is that the Game of Thrones-off rotation will be available online with the United States. You won’t have to wait for House of the Dragon episodes to finish on HBO to be available on Disney+ Hotstar. As was the case for the last season of GoT. This ensures that you won’t encounter any spoilers online.

However, there might be a little problem for video nerds. With Game of Thrones season 8, instead of having the episode ready to air on the platform, the episodes were live streamed/simulcasted on the platform at 6:30 AM every Monday. And while it was great to get fans excited for the Westeros series and drive traffic, the compression and video quality was way worse than the normal non-live streams available on Hotstar. This led to some opting for pirated copies, while others waited for the high-quality releases to drop on the platform. Hopefully that won’t be the case for House of the Dragon, and Disney+ Hotstar already has the episodes ready to stream.

It’s interesting that Disney+ Hotstar took this step with House of the Dragon from the start. Prior to the eighth and final season, Game of Thrones episodes aired weekly on Mondays at 7:30 a.m. IST, on Hotstar. The episodes were not to air until after the US run on HBO ended. As the hype and demand grew, the Disney Star-owned company opted for the aforementioned live-streaming option with Season 8 of GoT.

As a Game of Thrones prequel, House of the Dragon is set two centuries earlier and focuses on the Targaryen family. The 10-episode series serves as the build-up to the Civil War of the Dance of the Dragons, as Daemon Targaryen (Matt Smith) and Rhaenyra Targaryen (Emma D’Arcy) team up to fight for the Iron Throne. The seat currently rests with King Viserys I (Paddy Considine), who has no male heir.

House of the Dragon is co-created by Ryan J Condal (Colony) and Miguel Sapochnik, who directed some iconic Game of Thrones episodes, including the “Battle of the Bastards”. The show also stars Olivia Cooke as Alicent Hightower, Emily Carey as young Alicent, Milly Alcock as young Rhaenyra, Eve Best as Rhaenys Velaryon and Rhys Ifans as ‘Otto Hightower.

House of the Dragon premieres on August 22 at 6:30 a.m. IST on Disney+ Hotstar in India.

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