Vimeo Apps Get Apple TV, Android TV Overhaul

Video-sharing service Vimeo is branching out to the big screen with new TV apps for Apple TV, Android TV, and Samsung Smart TV.

This is Vimeo's first native app built for Apple's tvOS and its first Android TV app; the Samsung app replaces one released five years ago. But all three will let you browse and watch videos from a curated home page, which will be updated daily by Vimeo's editorial team.

Vimeo also wants to get you watching as soon as you open the apps. When you fire them up, the most recently highlighted video will automatically start playing, followed by the next video in queue, for better or worse. If you're not into the auto-play videos, you can navigate to find other content.

"We want people to know they can launch the app, lean back onto the couch, and have something incredible start playing right away without having to hunt for it," Will True, Vimeo's ‎senior product manager for TV apps, said in a statement.

There's also a feed you can scroll through to discover videos from the people, categories, and channels you follow on Vimeo. A Library feature will let you access all the videos you have purchased from Vimeo OnDemand, along with any content you've marked to Watch Later.

The new Apple TV and Android TV apps are available now. The Apple TV app includes all the features mentioned above while the Android version will initially have a more limited feature set. Vimeo is planning to roll out the rest of the features to Android TV in phases. The Samsung Smart TV app — Vimeo's first HTML5-based TV app — will be available "in the coming weeks," the company said.

The release comes shortly after Apple released its new TV app with iOS 10.2. It's intended to be a one-stop video-streaming app, where you can peruse and watch content from a variety of different apps. At this point, though, it does not have a deep integration with two of the most popular services, Netflix and Amazon Video.