Apple TV App

List of Apple TV content providers

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 18, 2016

It's annoying when you download an Apple TV app for your favorite entertainment provider only to realize that you cannot access the service due to regional restrictions, the need to connect with your cable service or pay for the service.

Of all the third-party content provider apps available for download in the tvOS App Store, only a handful of services are available on a worldwide basis.

To save you some time, Apple has put together a handy support document which lists all the content providers available on the second, third and fourth-generation Apple TV.

VLC media player lands on Apple TV

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 12, 2016

VLC for Apple TV was supposed to be released back in December, but it took longer than anticipated. As of Tuesday, the application is now available free in the App Store on the fourth-generation Apple TV.

According to Felix Kühne, lead iOS developer for VLC, the app is “a full port of VLC media player combined with platform-specific features” and it supports virtually all formats under the sun, just like its iOS counterpart.

Like Infuse and Plex, VLC permits you to stream audio and video item stored on network-attached drives to your Apple TV, without having to manually convert DIVX, AVI and other “foreign” files into iOS-friendly formats.

Infuse for Apple TV gains custom Favorites graphics, new zooming/sorting options and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 4, 2018

Infuse for Apple TV, a versatile media center app by aTV Flash Black developer FireCore, has received an update in the App Store today, bringing a bunch of welcome additions to the experience. No longer are those media folders you add to Infuse represented by generic icons: you can now add custom artwork to them, letting you pretty up Infuse's menu.

New zoom options have been added for removing encoded black bars, you can now sort your media by filename and rename or remove a Favorite by long-pressing its icon. Read on for the full list of changes in this edition of Infuse.

All-new iHeartRadio app coming to Apple TV soon with live stations and podcasts

Christian Zibreg ∙ January 5, 2016

iHeartRadio Media announced today at CES 2016 in Las Vegas that a whole new radio-streaming app will be coming to the fourth-generation Apple TV. In addition to a redesigned interface, it will allow users to experience all of the core elements of the service and let them access thousands of live and custom stations, including podcasts.

Both registered and unregistered users will be able to play live and custom radio stations, view For You recommendations, save favorite stations to a brand new My Favorites Radio feature and more, all from the comfort of their couch.

VLC launches full support for iOS 9, watchOS 2, SMB and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated November 9, 2016

Cross-platform media player by VideoLAN, called VLC, has been rewritten from the ground up for watchOS 2. And on the iOS side, VLC comes with many new features.

VLC plays a variety of video/audio files in non-iOS-friendly formats without conversion, including MKV movies.

The app also includes support for multiple audio tracks with 5.1 surround sound and subtitle tracks. In addition, VLC for iOS has dropped support for iOS 6.1 and now requires an iPhone, iPod touch or iPad with iOS 7.0+.

UPDATE: The post originally stated that VLC is now available on the new Apple TV. Regrettably, that announcement was an oversight on part of VideoLAN, which has since removed mentions of the Apple TV app from their release notes.

How to access changelog for Apple TV app updates

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated November 8, 2023

In this quick tutorial, you'll learn how to browse recently updated apps on your Apple TV and access official changelogs from developers, which typically provide a treasure trove of information detailing new features, refinements, fixes, and other information.

BBC iPlayer now available on Apple TV 4

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 6, 2017

BBC iPlayer, the on-demand application for watching live television channels and exclusive content from BBC, is now available on the 4th generation Apple TV.

“Christmas is a popular time for viewers to come to BBC iPlayer, as they unwrap new devices and browse and discover the BBC’s fantastic Christmas programs,” said iPlayer chief Dan Taylor-Watt.

“With the launch of iPlayer on new Apple TV, I’m delighted we've been able to give people another way of accessing the full breadth and range of BBC programs.”

Infuse for Apple TV gets its first update

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 4, 2018

Infuse 4 for tvOS, the Apple TV edition of the powerful media player for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, was updated last evening in the App Store following its debut on the fourth-generation Apple TV earlier this month.

For starters, the app now claims up to ten times faster metadata fetching (depending on the video type), which should drastically reduce the waiting time when Infuse initially scans a newly added network disk.

Oceanhorn gets iCloud save compatibility with Apple TV, flashier graphics on iPad Pro and more

Christian Zibreg ∙ December 3, 2015

Oceanhorn, the beautifully crafted fantasy adventure game from FDG Mobile Games GbR, has received an essential update in the App Store today. Bumped to version 2.7, this edition fixes the problem with iCloud save files created on the iPhone and iPad not being recognized on the Apple TV.

Those lucky iPad Pro owners will enjoy this update's ultra quality graphics on their tablet, with an improved world map and environment decoration.

Lastly, Oceanhorn 2.7 sports a better sound engine and fixes various bugs.

Review: Infuse 4 is the ultimate media center software for your Apple TV

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 4, 2018

It cracks me up that a jailbreak was needed to let Apple TV user enjoy their own media libraries directly on the device—and yet here we are today as FireCore, the same developer behind the aTV Flash(Black), unveils an Apple-sanctioned media player app for the new Apple TV.

As I wrote in my preview a few days ago, Infuse 4 for Apple TV (releasing later today in the App Store) is an awesome app that turns Apple's fourth-generation set-top box into a powerful, easy-to-use media center.

No longer do you have to worry about video formats, file conversion and subtitles—Infuse 4 for Apple TV takes care of all that jazz, and then some more. The app can stream your media from a Mac or Windows PC, NAS or Wi-Fi drives and even through a server app like Plex, Kodi or Servo.

It automatically fetches movie details and artwork, integrates with trakt.tv for keeping watched progress in sync on multiple devices, retrieves subtitles from OpenSubtitles.org and more.

Most importantly, its powerful decoder renders any “foreign” video format directly on the Apple TV hardware, no conversion needed, in silky smooth sixty frames per second.

What more can you ask for?

Twitter announces Digits-based logins coming to Apple TV apps

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 16, 2018

Hot on the heels of Facebook's release of an SDK for tvOS which lets developers create apps with Facebook Login based on eight-digit security codes, Twitter today announced bringing a similar feature of its own to the set-top box.

Digits, Twitter's own login and verification system based on phone numbers and verification codes, is coming to tvOS. This means that developers can now start writing Apple TV apps that users can log into by entering a short alphanumeric code in Safari on iPhone, iPod touch or iPad.

Apple TV apps can now implement Facebook Login and sharing features

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 29, 2015

If you own Apple's fourth-generation Apple TV, you have probably noticed that apps and games for the set-top box currently lack common social features such as Facebook Login and sharing.

But that's about to change soon as Facebook earlier this week announced immediate availability of the first beta of its Facebook SDK for tvOS, which gives developers the means to build immersive social experiences on tvOS.