A new option to select your default browser has been added to the Fire TV’s settings menu with the new 5.2.6.9 and 6.2.6.0 software updates that are rolling out to all models. The new option, located at the bottom of the Preferences menu, allows you to change which browser is used when launching the YouTube shortcut app, without needing to clear the app’s data.
In order for the default browser option to appear, you need to have at least Silk or Firefox browser installed on your Fire TV, as well as the YouTube app. You also need to have launched the YouTube app and selected to have it remember your browser selection. Prior to this new default browser setting, the only way to change which browser was used to load YouTube was to clear the YouTube app’s data.
Unfortunately, the default browser setting seems to only apply to the YouTube app. It is not a system-wide setting, since all other apps that try to open a browser will still prompt you to select a browser, even if you’ve set a default browser using the Fire TV’s new setting. Worse, if you select to remember your browser selection on the Android system prompt seen above, you can potentially have two different “default” browsers. Since the new default browser setting is not explicitly labeled as a “YouTube” setting and it does not appear under the “Applications” setting menu, this will mean that it will be updated to be a system-wide setting in the future that all apps abide by.
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If you guys can avoid this update I’d put it off. It bricked my FireTv 2 box. It won’t go past the Amazon logo now.
did you try and the hard reset using the combination of buttons? I did that when the update in August seemed to brick my box
I did try holding select and the play pause several times. No response.
oh dear….seems like really bricked then. When it happened to me i didn’t know about the thing of pressing the buttons to hard reset and when i went to support they didn’t even ask me to try it. When i said their software update bricked my box they didn’t seem to care as it was out of warranty. They said they do updates all the time so they can’t help it if the box gets screwed up. Amazingly bad attitude! A good way to get people to spent more money huh?
I used to say that Amazon had the best customer service of any large company. But that was back when you could e-mail them support questions. They used to route things to the correct department. Now you have to use chat or do a phone call which is not convenient. And when using chat, typically they really don’t help much. Amazon is going downhill fast. Target is much better these days. I’m glad they have competition now. If Target could get a streaming service going, I’d consider switching my Prime to something they have instead.
When my Gen1 remote died, they told me to buy a whole new Fire TV Box. Didn’t even explain how to get it to be fixed. So I ended up buying a used 4k stick for $10 and it works great, but the old Gen1 box is not too useful with only the app as a remote.
First of all, Target will never have a Target branded streaming device.
Secondofly, if they did, it would just be a Target sticker on somebody else’s device, and most likely Target would offload all support for the device over to that company.
Thirdly, Target would never do this anyways.
Ahhhh, you said streaming service. Change “device” to “service” in my above reply and “sticker” to “digital logo”.
haven’t updated on my fire tv 2 box yet but interesting to see the comment on the box being bricked by the update. I was actually hoping this update would fix the issue i’ve had with You Tube since the last update. When i use you tube (through both Silk and FF) the box goes off. Have to pull the plug and put in again to start. Anyone else had this issue?
This is wonderful news, as my daughter’s Firestick is on our account and somehow her use of YouTube on FireFox pops onto our bedroom TV once in a while.
I don’t seem to have this on the bottom of the preferences menu. I am updated to 5.2.6.9. Anyone else have the issue?
For some reason I do not have the option at the bottom of preferences either. I have both Silk and Firefox installed so it should appear.
They should’ve called it a “YouTube App” setting. Right now it is a huge misnomer – in addition to the problems you’ve outlined, as far as I remember you can’t cast YouTube from your mobile phone to Firefox on Fire TV … so basically all this setting does is decide what to do with users who download the fake YouTube app. Pretty lame, Amazon
Why is it a fake You Tube app? It’s an official app but it just doesn’t work anymore and you have to watch it in Silk or Firefox. Where does a mobile phone come into this?
It’s a fake YouTube app because 1) it previously was just an Android WebView and very featureless compared to YouTube apps written in Java, and 2) it’s not produced by Google.
The feature to cast from a mobile phone, if it honored this “Default Browser” setting, should work with YouTube.com/tv on Firefox, but it doesn’t. Therefore calling it a “Default Browser” setting is inaccurate.
Casting YouTube works from my phone to my firestick 4k using silk browser just fine.
Right, but if you preferred Firefox then this “Default Browser” setting wouldn’t honor that preference.