Setup guide
IPTV on Smart TV
Set up a player on a Samsung, LG or other smart television — and how to tell when the television itself is the limitation.
First, check what your television runs
“Smart TV” covers several unrelated systems. Samsung sets run Tizen, LG sets run webOS, and many other brands run Android TV or Google TV. The app store on each is different, and so is the selection of players available in it. If you are not sure which you have, the television’s settings menu will say, usually under About or Support.
1. Find a player in the television’s own app store
Open the app store built into the television and search for an IPTV player. Install one that is actually listed there rather than hunting for a specific name you have read elsewhere — an app that is not published for your platform cannot be installed on it, and there is usually a perfectly good alternative that is.
2. Enter your details
Open the player and look for the option to add a playlist or an account. Enter either the M3U playlist address or the Xtream Codes server, username and password, depending on what the app asks for.
Several television players avoid typing altogether: they show a device code or key on screen, and you enter your details on a web page on your phone instead. If your player offers that, take it — it is far quicker and removes the typing errors entirely.
3. Load and set favourites
Allow the first load to finish, then spend a couple of minutes marking the channels you actually watch as favourites. A television remote is a slow way to scroll a long list, and a short favourites screen makes the whole thing feel like a different service.
When the television is the limitation
Televisions get software updates for a few years and then stop, while the apps they run keep moving. On a set more than about five years old you may find the app store has nothing suitable, or that a player installs but stutters on higher-quality streams even though your connection is fast.
Neither is worth fighting. A current streaming stick in a spare HDMI port gives you an up-to-date app platform, better decoding and a faster interface for a small fraction of the cost of replacing the television. The set simply becomes a screen, which is all it needs to be.
Still deciding which plan fits?
Tell us which devices you use and how many screens run at once, and we will point you at the right duration and connection count before you pay for anything.