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Worst Apple TV app?

Which major service's app is the worst?

  • Total voters
    74
You haven't included Disney+
That one is full of bugs. You can't pause sometimes and it freezes regularly.
Have to re-autorisze regularly and can only do it by signing into the phone first won't work any other way.
No problems with anything esle but llike with all TV apps, searching is a real chore with a remote.
PS problems today because my mac looks like it's on an acid trip. Third screen problem: this one has been a real lemon.
 
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Dazn (Italy). It switches between 50fps and 25fps all the time, for apparent no reason. And watching sports at 25fps is a very painful experience.
 
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My report card of the user experience:

⭐ Practically unusable, worst in its class
⭐⭐ Very awkward
⭐⭐⭐ Serviceable
⭐⭐⭐⭐ Good
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Perfect

Library (e.g., search, browsing)PlaybackStability
Amazon Prime Video⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Apple TV+⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Disney+⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
ESPN⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
HBO Max⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Hulu⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Netflix⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Paramount+⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Peacock⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
YouTube⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
 
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w5jck said:
YouTube, and it sucks on other platforms too, not just tvOS.

There are a lot of dishonorable mentions too, of course. That is, apps which are not in the same league of bad as YouTube, but are very bad nevertheless. Philo is one I have trouble with nearly every day. It has daily streaming issues on some channels. Granted that is probably on their server side. But the app in general is poorly written. Streaming services are not software companies so their apps will tend to be amateurish at best anyway. But even some of Apple's own apps suck.
Click to expand...
I must move Philo to the top of my worst ATV apps. For the past two weeks it has been constantly crashing. Philo updated the app to fix the issues, but they still persist. It doesn't help that Apple has updated tvOS to 15.1 and no telling what issues that caused with Philo, if any. But the Philo app is currently unusable due to the frequent freezes and complete crashes. I have to watch Philo on my Fire TV Cube now, and it works fine on that platform. It also works fine on Android TV 9 which is loaded into my smartTV.
 
The funny thing here is, if you get right down to it, ALL media server type apps all suffer from the same affliction, no matter what device you are using. They all suck in their own little ways. The reality is, consumers want a consistent look and feel across all devices and apps for that matter... when they all try to each "go their own way" or treat each device as unique, you end up with this hodge-podge of a mess we see now.

Imagine if hitting the power button on a device did something entirely different based on what platform, manufacturer, or device you were using? That's literally what plagues these interfaces as a whole... inconsistency. And I do mean every damn one of them... every damn one of them. None are good... just less irritating. And that isn't a bar from which to measure anything.
 
pmiles said:
The reality is, consumers want a consistent look and feel across all devices and apps for that matter... when they all try to each "go their own way" or treat each device as unique, you end up with this hodge-podge of a mess we see now.
Click to expand...
I think Hulu just switched to Apple's bottom-of-the-screen interface for menu options (audio, subtitles, etc.) during a show. Disappointing change in the wrong direction, in my opinion, but mostly I wish they'd all change to the same thing.
 
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Worst Apple TV App: Apple TV App

We always try to give Apple the time to fix things. But its been enough time to say that the AppleTV app is a mess that doesnt deserve the amazing hardware it lives on.
 
KittyKatta said:
Worst Apple TV App: Apple TV App

We always try to give Apple the time to fix things. But its been enough time to say that the AppleTV app is a mess that doesnt deserve the amazing hardware it lives on.
Click to expand...
Oh I dunno, it’s certainly had some improvements made to it that’s for sure.
One huge recent addition is that owned
titles that have since been re-listed now show up using Search & Siri Search instead of being greeted with a page showing a price giving the impression you no longer own it.
 
DirecTV Stream has made AT&T TV Now even worse. Every time you open it, the screen dims and tells you to swipe up to see previously viewed channels. And then it doesn't go away. The DVR controls are less intuitive; if you're trying to delete a show you've just watched, you have to navigate UP to indicate whether you want to continue viewing or delete the program. It's such a buggy mess.
 
w5jck said:
I must move Philo to the top of my worst ATV apps. For the past two weeks it has been constantly crashing. Philo updated the app to fix the issues, but they still persist. It doesn't help that Apple has updated tvOS to 15.1 and no telling what issues that caused with Philo, if any. But the Philo app is currently unusable due to the frequent freezes and complete crashes. I have to watch Philo on my Fire TV Cube now, and it works fine on that platform. It also works fine on Android TV 9 which is loaded into my smartTV.
Click to expand...
Yesterday I updated my ATV 4K 2017 to tvOS 15.1.1. Afterwards I noticed that Philo had updated their ATV app to version 2.4.6 - 42. For the past 24 hours now Philo has been stable with no crashes. So maybe after 3 weeks of crashing they finally got it fixed. Not sure if tvOS 15.1.1 helped, or whether it was the latest Philo update that helped.
 
CBC News. In addition to poor UI design, hitting Menu when watching a video dumps you out to the Apple TV home screen, not to the CBC News app home screen.
?
 
Of the big streaming services, Amazon Prime is rather poor.

My pick for worst app in general has to be Pluto TV though.
 
From a UK perspective the iPlayer app is pretty woeful. So lacking compared to the iPad version or even the one on my smart tv.
 
dan980 said:
Dazn (Italy). It switches between 50fps and 25fps all the time, for apparent no reason. And watching sports at 25fps is a very painful experience.
Click to expand...
Dazn ( Canada) also. It has the broadcast rights for soccer and a decent selection of games but the interface and streaming are horrible: buffering, crashes when trying to fastforward or rewind.... very frustrating .
 
srbNYC said:
HBO said they'd have a new app by year's end. Tick tick tick....
Click to expand...
And they did, just a few days back.

Things they fixed:
  • Closed-captioning, once turned on, stays on. Even through app restarts. Yay!
  • "Skip Intro" now works!
  • Seems smoother, more responsive, overall
What they didn't fix:
  • Sometimes still have problems exiting from the Home screen
  • Sometimes becomes unresponsive, requiring an app restart

srbNYC said:
OK now HBO Max insists on turning on captioning every time I switch to it from another app
Click to expand...
Haven't noticed that, but we have CC enabled all the time, anyway, so we wouldn't.
 
Now I have to add the History Channel app to this list. Lately, when watching something in the app at the end of a commercial block the video just stops. I have to back out of the video and go back into the video to continue.
 
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