Google TV App Finally Launches On iOS

In September 2020, the Google Play Movies & TV app was abandoned in favor of Google TV, an occasion that was also marked by the debut of new hardware: the pebble-shaped and colorful Chromecast with Google TV. Despite that, the Google TV mobile app has remained exclusive to the Android side of the ecosystem while the old Google Play Movies & TV app continued to live on iPhones and iPads all the way into 2022. That status quo is finally changing.

The Google TV app for iOS is finally here, and it can now be downloaded from the App Store, according to a post on Google Blog. Folks that already have the Google Play Movies & TV on their iPhones will see an update option in the App Store that will upgrade them to the Google TV experience. Just to avoid any confusion, Google TV is also the interface that greets you when you connect Google's new Chromecast to a TV.

Google TV is the gateway to all entertainment needs of users bundled into a single place. All your subscriptions for services like Netflix and Hulu are neatly lined up on a unified dashboard, with a bunch of management and recommendation tricks in tow. The app's interface is broadly classified across a home page called For You, a Highlights section, and a Your Stuff segment.

The home page is where users will get recommendations based on their viewing habits neatly arranged across sections and pulled from all of the active subscriptions, as well as the option to rate them to further refine the recommendations. Users can save content to a watchlist that they can access on all screens on which the Google TV experience is available, assuming the same account is used.

In the Highlights section, users can access relevant content such as reviews and news related to the content they're watching. Another convenience is that the entire content library can go from mobile to large screen — complete with the watching progress in tow — thanks to the Continue Watching section on the For You page. There's also a casting option that can be accessed from the top of the app's home page.

The app likewise offers a virtual remote that can be used to control the Google TV interface on a larger screen like that of a television. Aside from navigating through the content feed, it can also be used to control media playback, summon the Google Assistant, perform search queries, and power the TV on and off. However, users need to go through a pairing process first in order to use the virtual remote available in the Google TV app.