Browsing for new apps and games on the Amazon Fire TV and Fire TV Stick has always been a bit of a limited experience. Your only options were to browse one of the curated lists like “What We Are Playing” or pick one of the provided categories with no control over the order in which the apps are displayed. That has finally changed with the latest software update. You can now select from several filtering and sorting options when viewing lists and categories to help you narrow down the available apps and games. Read on for an overview of the new feature and all of its available options.

Big thanks to my podcast buddy Ryan for uncovering this elusive addition. When examining the latest update’s source code and uncovering the upcoming shopping feature, I came across references to these new sorting and filtering options. However, I made the incorrect assumption that they would only be available at a future date to filter and sort search results. The ability to sort and filter search results may still arrive at a later date, but for now the new feature is limited to lists and categories within the Fire TV and Fire TV Stick’s “Apps” and “Games” sections.

The new sorting and filtering options will appear when viewing a category within the Fire TV or Fire TV Stick’s “Apps” and “Games” section. This new feature will also be available when viewing select “Popular Lists”. For example, the “New Releases & Updates” list and the “Potpourri” list within the “Apps” section allows you to filter and sort the lists, but the other smaller lists do not.

A “Filter” indicator will appear in the upper right-hand corner of the screen when it is possible to sort or filter the list of apps or games you are viewing. Pressing the MENU button on your remote or game controller will display a pop up with the various sorting and filtering options.

The available sorting options are: Best Selling, Relevance, Price (both ascending and descending), Average Customer Review, and Release Date. The “Relevance” sorting option is a pretty good indicator that these new sorting and filtering options may soon be available while using the Fire TV’s search functionality. Sorting by relevance when viewing a list or category is meaningless and should probably not even be an available option outside of search results.

AS for filters, you have the ability to only display apps and games that have been released within the last 30 days or within the last 90 days. You also have the option to filter by average customer review, meaning you can select to only see apps with a specific minimum number of stars. Lastly, you can select to only display free apps and games.

Once you’ve specified your desired sorting and filtering options, you can press the PLAY button on your remote to apply the options to the list you are currently viewing. Opening the filtering menu and press the REWIND button on your remote will clear all sorting and filtering options to their default state. Check out my update overview for other new features added with the latest Fire TV and Fire TV Stick updates.