Amazon is starting to roll out its redesigned Fire TV mobile app to customers, the company announced Thursday. While previously you could only use the app as a backup remote, the updated experience lets you browse and discover content directly from your phone, manage your watchlist on the go, and play titles on your TV from the mobile app.
“The updated app turns smartphones into a second screen for discovering what to watch next, making it easy to add a friend’s show suggestion to a watchlist even when you’re away from home,” Amazon wrote in an email to TechCrunch. “This seamless integration between mobile and TV creates a more flexible and convenient viewing experience for Fire TV customers to quickly find what they want to watch.”
The app is now available in the US, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Spain and the UK
Amazon says the refreshed look matches the new Fire TV user interface released last month, which was designed to focus more on content while simplifying navigation. The updated UI introduced rounded corners, varied gradients, consistent typography, and increased spacing between content, while providing more space for pinned apps.
The top navigation bar has been simplified into categories marked with clean icons for Movies, TV, Live TV, Sports and News. The search button is most easily accessible to the left of the Home tab.
Within these tabs, Fire TV displays the content you’re already watching along with recommendations from your subscribed services, organized into rows labeled “For You.” The tabs also have free movies, top movies and shows, and other paid content you might like.
The changes to the app and user interface come in response to the wave of streaming content, which has made it harder to keep track of what’s available on each service, requiring platforms like Fire TV to act more as discovery hubs rather than just places to launch streaming apps.
