TiVo’s new Apple TV app will only stream at 720p, 30fps

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TiVo might not release an Apple TV app after all
Suddenly, TiVo's CES announcement sounds a bit less exciting.
Photo: TiVo

Plenty of people were excited when TiVo recently announced a new app coming to Apple TV, letting users watch live and recorded content without having to buy multiple TiVo boxes.

They may be a bit less excited when they hear about the app’s big limitation, however. According to a TiVo executive, it will offer streaming that’s limited to 720p resolution, with 30 frames-per-second.

While that may be fine for some viewers, it definitely seems out of place in the high definition and 60-fps world of 2019. Speaking with TechHive, TiVo’s vice president of consumer products and services, Ted Malone, put the reason down to allocating resources. TechHive reports that:

“Malone said the TiVo hardware can technically support higher-quality streams, but not without dialing back some other capabilities, such as streaming to TiVo Mini Vox boxes. For better or worse, Malone still believes those Minis—which do support MPEG-2 video—are the best way to access TiVo on additional televisions. (Each TiVo Mini costs $180, and wireless connectivity will require an extra $60 adapter that’s coming out later this year.)

‘Even with Roku and Apple and Fire TV, the Mini still is a better multi-room solution if you want the same remote, the same performance, the same video quality,’ Malone said.”

The tvOS app for TiVo will supposedly arrive in Q3 this year. While there’s a chance that something might change between now and then, it’s certainly disappointing news. It’s not the end of the world, since 720p is hardly unwatchable, but there are bound to be more than a few people put after the excitement which accompanied TiVo’s CES announcement.

Will this news affect your decisions about TiVo in any way? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

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