tvOS 26 Adds These New Features to Your Apple TV

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Apple this week announced tvOS 26, which is now available in developer beta. The upcoming software update includes a handful of new features for the Apple TV, although some of the changes are only available on newer models.

tvOS 26
The most obvious change is a new Liquid Glass design, which was also introduced across iOS 26, iPadOS 26, macOS 26, and watchOS 26. The new design language includes shimmery app icons, and translucent elements that reflect colors. The new design is only visible on the Apple TV 4K (2nd generation) and Apple TV 4K (3rd generation).

tvOS 26 Liquid Glass
In the TV app, movies and TV show posters are now shown in vertical cards, which take up less space on the screen than the previous horizontal cards.

tvOS 26 Movie Posters
With an optional new setting, tvOS 26 can automatically display profiles when your Apple TV wakes, so that you can quickly access your watchlist and personalized recommendations in the TV app, as well as your Apple Music playlists.

tvOS 26 Profiles
tvOS 26 will link login information to your Apple Account for supported apps, making it easier for you to sign in to apps when setting up an Apple TV.

On the Apple TV, Apple Music subscribers have access to an Apple Music Sing karaoke feature that lowers the volume of the song's vocals so that you can sing along to the on-screen lyrics. tvOS 26 takes Apple Music Sing a step further by allowing you to use your iPhone as a wireless microphone, with your voice amplified through the TV's speakers. Plus, your friends and family can use their iPhones to queue up songs, or react with on-screen emoji.

apple music sing tvos26
In order to use an iPhone as a microphone for Apple Music Sing, you will need to have the latest Apple TV 4K (3rd generation) running tvOS 26.

Apple Music Sing has also gained lyrics translation for select songs in select languages.

FaceTime has received some enhancements on tvOS 26, including incoming call notifications, Contact Posters when starting a call, and Live Captions in French, German, Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, and Spanish.

tvOS 26 lets you designate any AirPlay speaker as the permanent speaker for your Apple TV.

The update also adds new Aerial screen savers captured across India.

tvOS 26 Aerial Screen Saver India
These are only the new features that Apple highlighted in its tvOS 26 press release, so expect more changes to be uncovered in the betas.

tvOS 26 will be released to the general public later this year. The update is compatible with all Apple TV HD and Apple TV 4K models.

Related Roundup: Apple TV
Buyer's Guide: Apple TV (Don't Buy)
Related Forum: Apple TV and Home Theater

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Top Rated Comments

kiranmk2 Avatar
kiranmk2
8 months ago
No real innovation in TvOS for years...

How about integrating smart lighting control to give an Amblight-esque experience with Homekit-compatible bulbs and light strips? How about developing a ML-based image reconstruction technique to better upscale 480/720 resolution footing to 4k? How about an App (or AirPlay 3) to stream games from your Mac (or PC) to the Apple TV in the same vein as Steam Link (and then open it up to other developers)? How about a robust program/film recommendation system for the AppleTV app based on al lthe streaming Apps you've connected to that? How about bringing back the trailers App rather than that abombination that is Trailers within the AppleTV app?
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
nuckinfutz Avatar
nuckinfutz
8 months ago
What exactly do TV OS developers do all day?

Maybe they're working on other projects and for a break they come into the TV OS

room and drop a few lines of code as they watch Severance.
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
turbineseaplane Avatar
turbineseaplane
8 months ago

What exactly do TV OS developers do all day?

Maybe they're working on other projects and for a break they come into the TV OS

room and drop a few lines of code as they watch Severance.
I feel like it's one guy named Brian and he does it part time.
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
jonnyb098 Avatar
jonnyb098
8 months ago
Not adding the Games app seems like a giant oversight or....they are planning to make a big splash with it later when announcing a new Apple TV. But that would be WAY too logical for them to do. Like stick an M4 or (coming soon) M5 chip in an Apple TV and instantly make it a console.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)
svish Avatar
svish
8 months ago
The new design is nice. Will be nice to set up the new Aerial screen savers. The improvements to Sing are also nice additions.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
gaximus Avatar
gaximus
8 months ago

Is this the same as "your apps (Netflix, Prime etc.) will align their profiles with your system profile? Because there seems to be quite a bit of ambiguity here and I, for one, really hope this is the case!
I think this is what it mean, expect Netflix probably won't adopt this API, because they don't use any of the AppleTV APIs.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
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