The next Apple TV needs this one feature to beat Roku and Fire TV ‣ Diverse Daily

If you’ve read any of my other AV material at Pocket-lint, you might be a little surprised to see the headline up top. I’ve got a couple of Apple TVs in my home, and I often wax about the device being the gold standard for add-on media streamers. I stand by that — even an older model is liable to be faster than most of the competition, and it offers a clean interface that’s mostly ad-free.

An updated model is expected later this year, presumably centered around a Gemini-enhanced version of Apple Intelligence. But whether it’s in 2026, 2027, or even 2028, I think we’re due for a more fundamental rethink of the product’s design. Hopefully, it won’t take too much persuasion to get you onboard.

What’s wrong with the Apple TV 4K?

Time out of joint

In many respects, nothing. Like I said, it has a slick interface, and performance that’s pretty much unrivaled unless you switch to a mini PC. Even a 2017 model can keep up with the latest apps, including some games, whereas anything that old from Amazon, Roku, or Google might struggle to run the latest version of Netflix, never mind an action platformer. On top of this, the 2022 edition supports just about any standard you might care about, from HDR10+ through to Matter and (on higher-end models) Thread and gigabit Ethernet. You can even pair any AirPlay speaker for wireless sound, although a pair of HomePods is preferable.

The issue is that if you know the history of the product, you can practically feel its outdated philosophies when using it. The original Apple TV was a giant set-top, designed to function as a kind of iTunes-based media server. The second-gen model shrank things down to the current form factor, but that and subsequent generations have continued to work on the premise that streaming means adding another stationary box to your entertainment center.

That’s hardly a sin, but the concept makes less sense in the current era. People have become accustomed to media streamers that can not only hide behind a TV, but jam into your bag if you want to take it to a hotel or guest house. To provide the amount of power an Apple processor needs, there might be no choice but to continue using a wall adapter instead of a TV’s USB port — but most Roku or Fire Stick owners end up doing that anyway for the sake of fast boot times.

There’s no obvious reason Apple couldn’t slim down the current model apart from its integrated power supply. There are only two or three ports to speak of, and if Apple can cram Matter and Thread into an iPhone 17, it shouldn’t be a challenge on something that doesn’t require a display or a lot of memory. Apple might want to come up with a dongle format that’s a little more stylish than the competition, but that’s not hard to imagine, even without an Industrial Design degree.

For some of you, the elephant in the room might be the Siri Remote. I like it overall, but I know that a lot of people detest its ergonomics, which make it all too easy to trigger Siri by accident. Swiping gestures are likewise imprecise, to the point that Apple caved several years ago and added arrow buttons. And for all of Apple’s posturing towards having a permanent place in your home theater, you can’t use the accessory as a universal remote. There aren’t even enough buttons, which might be acceptable if it weren’t for the fact that a fresh Siri Remote costs $59.

Even the Apple TV’s greatest strength seems out of sync. One of the reasons Apple turned to iPhone processors is that it had dreams of people treating the device like a game console. But the company has never seriously supported gaming in any arena, whether that meant paying for big-budget exclusives or designing a first-party controller. So gaming on the device has languished, and yet people are paying for performance they’ll probably never exploit.

That brings me to my last talking point: sticker price. The cheapest model is $129, while the version with 128GB, Thread, and Ethernet is an extra $20. Either can be worth it, but $129 is about $50 more than a Roku Ultra, and $30 more than a Google TV Streamer. That’s sometimes hard to justify when many TVs already ship with decent interfaces, and some add-ons that are $50 total will cover the bases. I realize that Apple prefers to target a “premium” (read: affluent) market — but at some point it has to adapt to customers, rather than expect them to do the reverse.

Can we expect an Apple TV overhaul sooner rather than later?

Signs point to no

There’s one major reason I’m not expecting a redesign in 2026: Apple Intelligence. It’s rumored that multiple Apple products have been delayed until now to accommodate the Gemini-based (read: fixed) version of that platform, including a refreshed Apple TV. And when the company is laser-focused on one complicated feature, other concerns tend to get sidelined to prevent delays. Indeed, Apple really can’t afford to get an Intelligence reboot wrong. Customers and investors were so disappointed by the 2024 incarnation that there’s been legal action, and worries Apple will never catch up to Google in the AI race.

That likely means waiting until 2028 or later for a complete overhaul, since the Apple TV doesn’t get annualized updates like iPhones, iPads, or Macs. The good news, such as it is, is that Apple Intelligence probably won’t be stealing the spotlight at that point. Apple might even feel obligated to sell a new form factor, since it’ll have been over a decade since the first Apple TV 4K was released. The company seems aware of how people perceive milestones, which in the past has given us products like the iPhone X.

Of course, it’s also possible that the Apple TV lineup could fork into more distinct variants. Conceivably the entry-level model could become the portable one, shrunk in size and cost, while continuing to leave Thread and Ethernet by the wayside. The top-end model might be the only one to offer all the bells and whistles, such as the latest A-series chip.

We might get a glimpse of Apple’s plans at WWDC 2026 in June. If some Apple Intelligence or tvOS 27 announcements seem to leave conspicuous gaps for new hardware, it might be that we’ll get everything at once. I’m just not counting on it, based on covering Apple for nearly two decades. It’s not the worst fate — I’m sure having a useful version of Siri takes priority for most of us.