Apple TV

Stay up-to-date on the latest Apple TV news and learn how to get the most out of your device with our comprehensive tutorials and guides. Discover new features, troubleshoot issues, and explore the best apps and games for your Apple TV.

How to update your Apple TV Siri Remote

Apple TV and Siri Remote on a red yellow gradient background

A tvOS update may include new firmware for the Siri Remote to fix bugs, improve reliability, and add new features. Improve your Apple TV experience by learning how to effortlessly update your Siri Remote, and stay in control with the latest features and improvements.

How to place Apple TV in recovery mode

If your Apple TV won't start up properly, or you are a developer who wants to install a tvOS beta, you must first put your set-top box in recovery (DFU) mode. As is the case with iPhone, iPod touch and iPad devices, entering DFU mode makes a malfunctioning Apple TV discoverable in desktop iTunes so you can restore it to factory settings, downgrade to an earlier version of the software or side-load a beta firmware onto it.

The method to put an Apple TV into DFU mode differs from that for other iOS devices. In this post, you'll learn how to put an Apple TV into recovery mode so you can restore it to factory settings if it's acting up.

How to stop ‘Up Next’ videos from autoplaying on YouTube

One of my pet peeves with YouTube is how after completing a video, the service shoves a new video down your throat with a feature called "Up Next," which gives you a 15-second time frame to click the "X" button at the top right of the video before the next video starts to play.

Sounds familiar? If you feel the same way, then you've stumbled upon the right tutorial, because we're going to be showing you how you can disable this feature right from the YouTube website without installing any plug-ins, hacks, or other crazy stuff.

How to watch Super Bowl 50 on iPhone, iPad, Apple TV, and other devices

On Sunday evening, millions of people will gather around their TV sets to watch Super Bowl 50. The game features the Denver Broncos taking on the Carolina Panthers, and kickoff is scheduled for 6:30 (ET).

For those of you who aren't going to be around a television Sunday night, but still want to follow along with the action, we've put together a list of ways you'll be able to do so using an iPhone, iPad, Mac and other devices.

How to filter mature language for Siri and Dictation

Sometimes when you use the dictation feature on your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad—or just converse with Siri and it misunderstands you—you might be in for a surprise seeing explicit language that you don't really want others to see, especially if you talk to Siri on your new Apple TV and kids are present.

Fortunately, both iOS and tvOS give you all the controls you need to prevent profanities from showing up when you use speech-to-text or Siri. In this post, you'll learn how to disable explicit language for Siri and Dictation on your iPhone, iPod touch or iPad and filter out explicit language for Siri on your Apple TV.

How to put the Apple TV into retail Demo Mode

A few days ago, we showed you how to access the Apple TV's "Advanced Settings" mode. That particular option is geared towards Apple employees. Today, we're going to show you how to place the Apple TV into Demo Mode.

Demo Mode, according to Apple, is a special setting that locks down many Apple TV settings to keep Apple TV “fresh” for each customer interaction. Each time the Apple TV comes out of the screensaver, the Home screen layout will reset to present the default interface.

In a nutshell, Demo Mode is what you see when looking at an Apple TV while in an Apple Store or other big box retail store. Have a look at the rest of this post to see how to enter Demo Mode on your own Apple TV.

How to access tvOS’ hidden ‘Advanced Settings’ menu on Apple TV

The Apple TV features a hidden "Advanced Settings" menu, which contains some interesting Apple employee-centric features. Accessing the hidden settings menu is remarkably easy to do, all you need is a paired Siri remote to get going.

Inside the hidden Advanced Settings menu, you'll find an AppleConnect login option, a menu pertaining to loading a VPN Profile, Sleep Delay settings, and more. It's generally not something that most customers will even care about, and we can't recommend dilly-dallying around and changing values, but it's interesting to know it's there.

How to watch local live TV on Apple TV with an HDHomeRun + antenna combo

It is possible to legally watch free over the air terrestrial television via the Apple TV. This can easily be accomplished by connecting an HDHomeRun to your home network along with an ATSC antenna to pull in free over-the-air high definition local channels.

It's basically the equivalent of connecting an antenna to your TV. TVs generally include a tuner built in, which allows the unit to display the channels pulled in from over the air. Wouldn't it be cool, though, if you could broadcast all of those channels on your home network? By using an HDHomeRun, you can easily tap into free high definition television streams via the Apple TV and an app like Kodi. You can even watch live TV on your iPhone, Mac, or other devices.

In this video tutorial, I'll show you how easy it is to get live local channels on your Apple TV. That means you can watch high definition streams for NBC, ABC, CBS, FOX, and more. There's no monthly subscription involved, or anything like that, which makes this perfect for cord cutters. Have a look.

How to install Kodi on the new Apple TV 4

It's been a while in the making, but it is now possible to install Kodi on tvOS. Granted, this is a very early tutorial, and Kodi for Apple TV 4 is still in the pre-pre-alpha stages, but it does work, although not perfectly yet.

Still, the fact that we can even get Kodi on the Apple TV without jailbreaking is a win in itself. In this video tutorial, I'll show you how to install Kodi on the new Apple TV running tvOS.

How to control your Mac with the Siri Remote

Better Touch Tool, one of the most useful power-user utilities available for macOS has been updated to include support for Siri Remote control. The update, which is currently available as an alpha version download, lets you control your mouse with the Siri Remote, as well as assign shortcuts and mouse clicks to the Touch Surface and each of the remote's buttons.