An Apple TV Refresh is Coming in 2025 - Here's What You Should Know

[Chungry]

I got my 4K Apple TV device years and years ago. There is zero prospect of me upgrading to a newer version as it does its simple read-only job quite well.

But... for all the gadgets Apple tosses in our direction, none would grab my attention more than a sleek Mac mini style powerful gaming machine and controller. OK, you'd need substantial investment in games software, but it strikes me that Apple are missing out. The gaming market is huge. I mean proper photorealistic games. They would make a lot more money out of me than they do with Apple TV+.

I think the opportunity costs is far too high and Apple has contented itself with some years-old AAA titles to grab attention every few years and pad WWDC keynotes. They don't have the stable of executive talent to start making a go at gaming and they would need to form those relationships and spend money (studios, exclusivity, you name it). They don't get gaming on a fundamental level aside from "oh yeah that something people try to do on our stuff" which is pretty much the extent.

Makes me wonder why they put effort into putting a wrapper on open source stuff like the game porting toolkit or the more exotic metal ray tracing when it's gonna go unused. But this is Apple so they throw that stuff at the wall to see what sticks but they aren't serious about it (clips, journal, invites). This makes me sad

 

[drpiety]

No bitstream.... no buy.

 

[tridley68]

It figures I just bought a 68Gig in January of this year guess that one will go in the kids room and the newer one will go in the living room when it comes out. 🤣

 

[bilbo--baggins]

Hope they do a very cheap entry model as well as a high end model. Either allow the Mac Mini to run an Apple TV mode or release an M4 version of Apple TV.

 

[Plutonius]

So are we just going to repost that it's coming with the same 3 bits of non-groundbreaking info (a new A-series chip? Who could guess!) every 3 days until it launches?

It looks to me like Apple is marketing it to people who already own an Apple TV as a replacement for their current Apple TV.

 

[bodonnell202]

Honestly, the only thing that could be exciting about this is updating to an A17 or A18 chip means native AV1 support. The Apple TV as a gaming device is talked about every new generation and it never really catches and I have zero interest in AI features on a streaming device.

 

[tyranne201]

Apple TV+ works fine on webOS. I really don't see the need to dump another 100 dollars to apple. I just want to watch movies and series. And it is enough for me.

 

[Miles Teg]

I would get an updated one if it ran Apple Intelligence making Siri more useful.

 

[ZipZap]

Get rid of the crappy remote

 

[Ctrlos]

I honestly think it’s Apples best product. Competitively priced and 10000x better than the crappy processors and UI on smart TVs. I have zero issues with mine and tvOS does a good job of getting out of the way.

Any price increase puts it into competition with devices like the Xbox Series S which is something they should avoid. $180 is the top.

As well as the standard stat bump I’d like to see Apple add some hacking focus beyond Arcade. It’s actually not a bad device for video games, having infinite keybind profiles and compatibility with every major controller. But an A17 Pro chip would put it on par with a PS4 in terms of power and the titles should match.

Opening up the iOS controller-compatible library to automatic Apple TV compatibility would be a great start. It would increase the number of available games by thousands with no input from developers needed.

 

[Rhodes187]

Soooooo many shortcomings with AppleTV and it feel like either they don't care or don't have the creativity anymore to improve. It's becoming hard to justify staying with the platform (and we have 4 of them)
1.) Remote sucks, at a minimum new one needs Airtag (with noise) not the damn game hotter/colder that currently exists using the phone
2.) Credentials should be shared across AppleTVs when logged into the same iCloud account (say upstairs and downstairs TV)
3.) Search is abysmal and untrustworthy in what apps it will return results for. Many times we'll get results for AppleTV buy/rent only when one of our apps already has the content (NetFlix, Max, Peacock, etc).
4.) Random apps keep logging out on their own (NBCSports, Hulu, etc)
5.) Photos app is the biggest missed opportunity. This bridges the best screen to all your iCloud photos/videos yet has no search, AI, etc.... Want to look for something, it's all in a LONG chronological scroll, what a joke.

But no worries, Apple is working on the iPhone Air, you'll likely pay more and have less battery, BUT it will be 2mm thinner, which will be a night/day difference to the crazy bulky ones that exist now (sarcasm).

 

[axboi87]

As long as it has Hardware AV1 decoding I'll be happy

 

[10anta]

I am finding it hard to understand why Apple keeps investing time and money when it puts no effort into making the AppleTV competitive.

With a $30 GoogleTV dongle I can add Ethernet, SD card and external storage options via USB-C for under $50. Have access to AppleTV+ including all the other Big Name streaming services and more so. Plus I can add a web browser and use it as an ultra portable computer in a pocket.

Apple seems to be lost when it comes to AppleTV, iPad/OS and VisionPro. Not sure what is happening in the spaceship.

The Apple of old used to say it was ‘selling experiences’ or ‘utility’, ‘not just making hardware and software’.

Apple needs to ask what it wasn’t the Apple TV to be and what it should allow users to do, not just make pretty hardware in the hope it generates profit.

 

[dtemp]

The ‌Apple TV‌ is expected to continue to offer Thread integration and support for Matter when used as a home hub for smart home products. Wi-Fi 6E could theoretically improve connectivity for smart home products because the 6GHz band typically has reduced signal interference and more bandwidth.

Note that Thread works exclusively over 2.4GHz spectrum, and doesn't use WiFi at all. The AppleTV's WiFi would be used for the "backhaul" of connecting any Thread devices to the internet (assuming the AppleTV doesn't have a wired ethernet connection), but these tend to be very low bandwidth devices that consume kilobytes a day of internet bandwidth. In this respect, 2.4GHz WiFi may be a better backhaul network, as it allows longer-range connections to be sustained, albeit at lower bandwidth.

 

[WylyQuimby]

Zwift works well on my AppleTV, but it would be nice to get a visual upgrade.

 

[Aeronauts]

The Apple of old used to say it was ‘selling experiences’ or ‘utility’, ‘not just making hardware and software’.

Apple needs to ask what it wasn’t the Apple TV to be and what it should allow users to do, not just make pretty hardware in the hope it generates profit.

I think Apple TV is only kept going to sell more subscriptions.

 

[maxfromdenmark]

I can’t wait. It’ll be my first one. 🥰💯🤙🏻

Oh someone’s cherry will be popped up…. 😆

 

[Chungry]

Zwift works well on my AppleTV, but it would be nice to get a visual upgrade.

This is my main pain point with AppleTV. It's plug and play out of the box with my trainer, power meter, cadence, heart rate strap. It's a breeze! But it's such a small market (I guess) that Zwift has not bothered to put engineering time into updating the graphics for YEARS now despite it being capable even for as old as the current model is. The graphics are annoying. But I'm not setting up a computer in the place where my trainer is

 

[Slainor]

And still cant passthrough some Audio Signals

 

[mrr]

Include Safari browser !!!

 

[MNGR]

I am finding it hard to understand why Apple keeps investing time and money when it puts no effort into making the AppleTV competitive.

With a $30 GoogleTV dongle I can add Ethernet, SD card and external storage options via USB-C for under $50. Have access to AppleTV+ including all the other Big Name streaming services and more so. Plus I can add a web browser and use it as an ultra portable computer in a pocket.

Apple seems to be lost when it comes to AppleTV, iPad/OS and VisionPro. Not sure what is happening in the spaceship.

some of us are happy with the ATV

 

[Dorfdad]

true HDMI 2.1 with full bandwidth, WIFI 7 not 6, Double the storage, and Ram so we can actually game on the thing. and they need to revamp their policies to allow Geforce Now, Xbox, Sony, and other streaming services for games. otherwise its a no go for me.

 

[GazzaP]

Been waiting years. I have a 2nd gen 4k Apple TV. Been waiting a long time to upgrade. Every time I think about it, there’s rumours of a new one about to be released. Never happens of course. Is 2025 actually going to be any different?

 

[dmr727]

some of us are happy with it.

Yeah I'm happy with mine, but I don't game with it or anything. It's light years better than a Roku I used to have.

 

[JeffPerrin]

Been waiting years. I have a 2nd gen 4k Apple TV. Been waiting a long time to upgrade. Every time I think about it, there’s rumours of a new one about to be released. Never happens of course. Is 2025 actually going to be any different?

Why wait? You can never have too many Apple TVs! 😁

Seriously though, based on these rumors, I doubt you'll see much of a difference over your 2nd gen 4K. Most improvements seem to come through tvOS updates.