My main complaint is that there isn’t a consistent experience between apps. Things are in different places, actions do different things in different apps, no gesture support, subpar players with horrible scrubbing, etc.
I think all apps should be held to a few basic UI/UX standards so going from one app to another isn’t a completely different experience.
The attached photo is just one example. Within the Apple TV app itself, long pressing an icon brings up this great menu allowing you to go straight to the show or the episode page. Long pressing in most other apps removes the show from your now playing list! All of these conflicting actions need to be rectified.
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Just got mine a week ago. I love it but my less tech savvy mom has been having a lot of trouble figuring out what to press in each app, because they’re all different.
Yes!! Every app has different playback screens and controls and many apps seem like they’re really not optimized for Apple TV
Should definitely be unified like with CarPlay
If they make it unified like CarPlay they will have the same lack of Apps as CarPlay.
Keep in mind CarPlay also has legal limitations due to being a screen in a car. So most companies have a vested interest in following the guidelines given by Apple as it saves them from having issues.
I’d be fine if they just enforced their player on ever app. Other than that, I don’t think it’s necessary but Amazon and max have the worst players. Hell, Max doesn’t even tell you how many minutes into a program you are. The most basic function, and they can’t even do that right.
I think the “new” player UI (tvOS 15?) is very unintuitive. Very difficult to change subtitles and audio track. In the older UI you would just swipe down. It was clear and consistent.
Thanks! These are the things I’m talking about! 👍🏼
I feel like Apple is less likely to change around thing and add new things so I think it might be best they let every app do their thing. Although consistency would be nice on ATV and iPhone
As a streaming device, the Apple TV has a relatively low market share. Even Apple is bringing its TV app to more and more other devices / platforms. Weakening their own position by making their own streaming device kind of redundant. And I think if they would enforce those things, some apps would just vanish from Apple TV.
On the other hand many available apps somtimes even feel kind of “left behind” compared to other platforms. And I’ve heard several times now that developers can’t just use the same cross-platform code base on ATV as on other devices. And I think that might be the reason for the state of apps like Spotify or Netflix. So if Apple can’t enforce a unified look & feel, maybe it would be even better if they would put some effort in making tvOS more developer friendly. In a way that developers can more easily use the same code base on ATV than on other devices.
Even Apple is bringing its TV app to more and more other devices / platforms. Weakening their own position by making their own streaming device kind of redundant.
Please correct me if I’m wrong about this, but doesn’t the AppleTV+ available app on 3rd party devices only let users stream content from the AppleTV+ subscription service? Or does it work like the Prime Video app in that it also lets you view content from additional services provided that the user has subscribed to those additional services specifically via the appleTV app itself?
Because I’ve been under the impression that the AppleTV+ app that’s currently available on Roku boxes, smart TVs, game consoles, etc. only allows users to watch AppleTV+ content. And if that’s right, then making the AppleTV+ app available on Roku boxes does not weaken Apple’s position in the streaming device market (just like how being able to watch Prime Video content on an AppleTV box in addition to an Amazon Fire Stick does not weaken Amazon’s position in the streaming device market).
Although regardless of me being right or wrong about the above, one thing that certainly is weakening Apple’s position in the streaming device market is their bone-headed decision to give their box (AppleTV) and streaming service (AppleTV+) nearly identical names. It has created so much confusion in the marketplace. It’s even created confusion in this subreddit which on paper is supposed to be devoted to the box itself, but often seems tons of submissions about AppleTV+ content which can be viewed on numerous streaming devices.
The TV app available on non-Apple devices lets you view content from their TV+ subscription service and your content purchased on iTunes. And I think that’s the crucial point here: Before they started to spread their TV app, you needed an Apple TV to watch your iTunes library on your TV. But now with the app available on so many other devices, they made the Apple TV evitable for using their own services. So this might even strengthen their position as a content provider, but I think on the other hand it also weakens the position of the Apple TV as a hardware device. And I think in this regard they gave away their leverage in forcing UI/UX standards on other app providers. Because I think it won’t hurt them much not to be present on Apple TV if this would mean time and cost intensive extra work to conform with Apple’s UI/UX standards.
They’re only around 4% of the market. But that’s still plenty enough given the entire market’s size I’d seriously doubt content providers would ignore that four percent. It takes a lot to gain and keep subscribers. Putting those at risk due to some additional development costs would be business lunacy.
I just want Picture in Picture across all video playing apps
Yes. I would also like to see customizable Multiview work beyond just some sports on TV+. A configurable 2x2 grid that works across all playing apps would be a game changer!
Would love them to, especially when you look at apps like prime video, YouTube and YouTube tv, who insist on using their own players, that are not as good of an experience.
Besides, if you leave or turn off the atv with a video from YouTube onscreen, it will cockblock whatever you try to airplay later. That’s super annoying
Any attempt to force the use of Apple’s player would return the Apple TV to “pretty much useless” status when it comes to Plex. So, personally, I really don’t want to see that.
as I said on /r/plex, this is why I pay for infuse with free plex account 🤷♂️
I can’t sacrifice the Plex UI and features. It was a harder choice when Apple TV’s Plex app transcoded everything but now it hardly ever does so Infuse holds no real benefit for me.
so Infuse holds no real benefit for me.
The tvOS Plex app currently has a massive stack of issues, including a critical one that overheats the third gen Apple TV 4K with high bitrate 4K remuxes to the point that it chokes on them and stop playing (I´m not joking!).
Infuse does not overheat it because it uses the Apple TV hardware acceleration for every aspect of their custom player (Metal), whereas Plex still uses Open GL for quite a lot.
My recommendation at this point is to use Infuse instead. Yeah, its not free, but it uses the Apple TV hardware and feature set to its full potential, and performs so much better.
Never ben an issue for me, and Infuse is far too ugly and lacking features for me to use it.
Infuse would be equally as worthless
u/GenghisFrog
Infuse is a great case of making exceptions pertaining not using the native player, yes.
what? their player is (at least looking like) the stock apple TV SDK one.
The apps you’ve mentioned are simple web wrappers that display HTML5 content. If you go to youtube.com/tv you’ll get the exact same web page that these streaming apps display. They do this because it’s cheaper to maintain and you get the the exact same experience on every device. Not playing the devil’s advocate here, just explaining why these apps are so bad and why I don’t think this is going to change. In fact, Google did provide native apps on some plattforms and later replaced them with their low-quality HTML5 apps.
If a developer is going to use their own player, they should be required to do two things.
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Provide a reason which must be approved by Apple during certification. What do they want/need their player to do that the default player cannot do. There are plenty of good justifications for implementing a custom player, and the developer better have at least one otherwise what’s the point? For example, the YouTube player allows users to thumb-up/down a video which is a thing they should expect to be able to do while watching YouTube via AppleTV.
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Alternative players MUST be required to have feature parity with the default player. It’s fine if they want to add more features, but they sure as hell should not be allowed to submit an app with a player that can’t do everything the default player can. I want to pull my hair out every time I use apps that don’t have the 10-sec skip feature, or ones that don’t let you “circle the ring” to scrub, or even worse ones that don’t allow you to effectively scrub at all.
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Dolby Digital on YouTube flashes black for a full second everytime I load a video or ad, it’s so infuriating
Change your AppleTV to 4k sdr, with matching on, and it won’t do that anymore. You’ll get a quick black flash when loading Dolby or hdr content, but there’s way more sdr content out there.
The prime video app scrolling is so bad I have to browse on my phone and then search for it on the TV
To a certain extent, yes, but apps like Infuse remind me of the potential that lies in moving away from the Apple mold.
Would you pay $100 more for an AppleTV with a more consistent UI? $50 more? 5¢ more? If the answer to these is “no” then there’s your answer.
Not in this way. It should enforce a consistent playback bar though.
Killer work you have here.
Apple can try to enforce all they want but they dont have enough leverage to do so. There are too many other great/inexpensive alternatives to the Apple TV. If I’m a developer and I’m designing the Disney+ app, for example, how am I incentivized to edit my app specifically for one platform?
I feel like they should. But only if Apple TV 4K box is in a better market share than it is now.
I feel like if they did that, they’d risk an exodus from the streamers to pull out of the platform, or one of the big ones withholding support for the app because of such a sweeping change in their TV apps.
Completely agree. Sadly, the Apple TV 3 had exactly this — standard ‘templates’ for apps to use so they all behaved in a similar way. The templates available weren’t great, but instead of improve them, Apple decided to just let app developers do whatever they wanted. The result is the mess you describe.
That mess is what’s been on consoles for decades.
I don’t like, you don’t like, and Apple don’t like it but everyone (apparently) likes everything to be different everywhere