The Fire TV’s integration with live channels and services, colloquially called the live experience, has continuously evolved and expanded over the years. Amazon has now highlighted that there are over 400 channels from nearly 20 providers integrated together into the Fire TV’s various interfaces. Over 200 of those channels are available free with ads and, in most cases, without needing to sign up or log in to any app or service.
The full list of apps and services that integrate live channels into the Fire TV’s live experience can be found here. It includes completely free services, like Tubi and Pluto, as well as paid services, like YouTube TV and Philo. Sling TV uniquely integrates both free ad-suported channels as well as their paid channels. Most recently Xumo and Amazon’s own News app have integrated channels and Plex will be integrating soon.
Fire TV first dipped into live channels with the release of the first Fire TV Edition televisions in 2017. With those TVs came the arrival of a channel guide and an “On Now” row on the home screen to display channels from the built-in over-the-air tuner. It wasn’t until early 2018 that Amazon added those new live channel interfaces to all Fire TV devices so that customers subscribed to Prime Video Channels with available live streams, like HBO and Showtime, had a way to easily browse what was currently airing live.
When the Fire TV Recast launched in late 2018, it gave Fire TV owners a way to add over-the-air channels to the Fire TV’s live interfaces without needing to buy a Fire TV Edition television. Less than a month later, the now-defunct PlayStation Vue service became the first 3rd-party provider to integrate channels into the Fire TV’s channel guide. This opened up the flood gates for other apps and services to integrate their channels as well, with Pluto, Philo, and Sling TV being among the first to do so.
With numerous apps and services already integrated into the channel guide and the “On Now” home screen row, Amazon launched the Live tab on all Fire TV devices as a central place to browse live content across multiple services in a more visually appealing way than the channel guide offers. This was the first time Amazon added a new tab to the Fire TV’s main navigation menu. The Live tab has since expanded to the UK, Germany, Canada, and India.
It has been a steady road of improvements and expansion to where things are today. For fans of linear television, this is probably only the beginning of what’s to come.
@AFTVnews
AFTVnews
Terrific! I see the ‘Live TV’ tab and button on remote being a staple in future Fire TV hardware releases.
xumo and news app aren’t available to sync in live tv on my 2nd gen fire tv box. All of the previous apps you mention are available to sync.
xumo and news app finally became available to sync on my second gen fire tv box.
Amazon News channels are not showing on the channel guide. I can see it under settings – live tv – sync sources, I can even select channels to be favorites there, but when I go to live and start watching tv, the amazon news channels are not on the guide.
Any suggestions?
2nd gen fire tv box
I can’t get them to sync either, even though it says the channels have been loaded.
This is the expected behavior for Fire TV News and Twitch, at least current state. Live only, but not in the guide.
Looking forward to PLEX’s free channels being added soon.
What do you mean on “live only”?
It’s not about quantity. It’s about quality. Doesn’t matter if there are 400 channels or 4,000. If the content is sub-par, then no one will watch it.
Have you ever wondered where the channels for TubiTV come from in the LiveTV app? I couldn’t find it until I started fooling around with it. It turns out that it is NOT under the Channels menu. Launch Tubi (right now it’s showing an ad for Windtalkers). Click down until you get to a category called ‘News on Tubi’. Despite the name there are a couple of non-news channels there too such as Fubo Sports, Pattrn (a nature channel) and WeatherNation.
I have a Insignia Fire TV that I purchased in the Summer of 2019. The guide on my TV only shows the live channels on the IMDB TV app and Showtime related Prime Channels since I have them right now due to a deal that Amazon was offering. For the live IMDB TV channels the ones I’ve watched show up as squares on the main screen that display whatever is airing on them at the moment. I guess channels from the other apps mentioned will make it to my guide eventually.
The free channels don’t just show up. You have to install the apps that offer the additional live channels, then go into settings/live tv/sync sources and click on each source so that the live channels are loaded into your guide.
I had done everything except going into the Live TV settings which I didn’t know about. Already had the apps installed. Thanks for filling in the missing piece of info I needed to make things work.
“News by Fire TV” channels are not loaded into the guide.