How To Turn Off Auto-Play On Your Amazon Fire TV

Auto-play (videos that begin playing as soon as they're highlighted, moused-over, etc.) has been a "feature" across multiple platforms and services for quite some time, and the typical response is usually not very positive. There are a number of reasons why you may not want videos to start playing without your direct input — a need to be quiet, potentially inappropriate content you don't want to risk seeing, they're just annoying, etc. — but even so, it remains.

Even with all of its upgrades and improvements that have taken place over the years, Amazon Fire TV is no exception. You're likely familiar with the Prime Video ads along the top of the Home screen that will play (whether you want them to or not) if you so much as pause over them accidentally while scrolling through the thumbnails on your screen. At which point you're going to at the very least catch a brief second or two of whatever the new thing Amazon is pushing might be until you move off of it again.

Fortunately, there is a way to put a stop to this particular frustration, and it's a one-and-done process that will remain in effect unless you decide to change it back. Or possibly if something else happens to reset your options, like a software update and the like.

Shutting off the auto-play "feature" is a very simple process, so long as you know where to look for it. Once you're ready to tell your Amazon Fire TV (or Fire Stick) to lay off the auto-playing ads, here's what you need to do:

1. From the Home screen, select the Settings option.
2. In the Settings menu, select Preferences and then choose Featured Content.
3. Select Allow Video Autoplay to turn it off.
4. Next, select Allow Audio Autoplay to turn that off as well.
5. Go back to the Home screen and scroll over one of the video ads to make sure auto-play has been shut off.

Keep in mind that you do need to turn off both Video and Audio auto-play for this to work properly, so make sure neither of them is left on before you exit the menu. But once they're off they should remain off indefinitely, leaving you free to enjoy browsing through Prime Video's various menus without any unwanted ads playing.