Smart TV App Development

Native tvOS apps built with SwiftUI and AVKit, the frameworks Apple's own apps use. Navigation uses the Focus Engine, tvOS's built-in system for managing remote-control focus traversal across your UI. You define the focusable elements and their layout; the Focus Engine handles which element receives focus when the user presses up, down, left, or right on the Siri Remote. This produces the precise, predictable navigation behaviour Apple reviewers look for during certification.

Video playback is handled via AVKit's AVPlayerViewController, giving you a consistent native playback UI with transport controls, subtitle selection, and audio track switching that match what tvOS users expect. For apps requiring custom playback UI, we build directly on AVPlayer and AVPlayerLayer with custom overlay controls. FairPlay Streaming DRM is integrated at the AVAssetResourceLoaderDelegate layer, handling licence request, response parsing, and key storage. HLS delivery with adaptive bitrate switching ensures playback quality adjusts to the available network speed without buffering interruptions. Content catalogues are populated via your existing API or a Sanity CMS backend where needed. Top Shelf extension support for featuring content on the Apple TV home screen, deep link handling for Universal Links, and TVML/TVJS where a hybrid approach suits the content type. Siri voice search integration for content discovery via the system search API.

Android TV and Google TV apps built on the Leanback support library, which provides the BrowseFragment, DetailsFragment, SearchFragment, and PlaybackFragment components designed for the 10-foot UI. For apps requiring a fully custom layout, we build on Compose for TV, Jetpack Compose's TV-specific components and FocusRequester/FocusProperties APIs that give fine-grained control over D-pad navigation without the constraints of the Leanback fragment hierarchy.

Video playback uses ExoPlayer (now Media3), the open-source player Google uses for YouTube on Android TV. ExoPlayer supports HLS and DASH adaptive streaming, Widevine DRM licence integration, offline download via the Download Manager API, subtitle rendering via SubtitleView, and SCTE-35 ad cue detection for live streams. Widevine L1 hardware-secured DRM is required by major content providers; we implement the MediaDrm API against your licence server and test on L1-capable hardware before submission. Google Play certification requires a TV launcher activity with a Leanback feature declaration and UI that passes the Leanback UI check tool. Fire TV (Amazon) sits on the Android TV codebase and is covered by the same build with minor manifest changes.

Samsung Tizen apps are built on a web-based stack: HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript running in the Tizen Web API runtime. This is distinct from a mobile web app. The Tizen SDK exposes device APIs for key events (remote control input), AVPlay for video playback, webapis.avplay for DRM-protected streams, and the TV-specific APIs for resolution, audio output, and system information.

Navigation is implemented by intercepting remote control key events (VK_UP, VK_DOWN, VK_LEFT, VK_RIGHT, VK_ENTER) and managing focus state in JavaScript, since CSS :focus alone doesn't produce the predictable traversal Samsung devices require. We use a spatial navigation library or a custom focus manager tuned to the specific layout rather than generic browser focus behaviour. Video playback uses Samsung's AVPlay API rather than the HTML5 <video> element, which is required for Widevine and PlayReady DRM integration and for accessing HEVC and 4K playback capabilities on supported models. Resolution handling covers 1080p and 4K with appropriate asset scaling, memory-conscious image loading given the tighter RAM budgets on older Samsung models, and performance tuning for the V8 engine version present on each hardware generation. Samsung Apps store submission requires passing the Samsung Smart TV certification checklist covering UI, playback, and performance criteria.

LG webOS apps share the web-based development model with Samsung Tizen but use LG's own SDK, the Enact framework (a React-based UI library built by LG for webOS), and the webOS.js API surface for device integration. Enact's Spotlight module handles D-pad spatial navigation in a React component tree, providing the focus management behaviour LG Content Store reviewers check during certification.

Video playback on webOS uses the luna-send API for media pipeline control on older webOS versions and the HTML5 <video> element with webOS Media API extensions on newer models. Widevine DRM integration uses the webOS CDM (Content Decryption Module) via the media pipeline API. DASH delivery is the primary format; HLS is supported on webOS 4.0 and later. We target the LG webOS SDK version range that covers the installed base of devices your audience is likely using, which spans 2018 models (webOS 4.x) through current (webOS 24), and test on each major generation given the JavaScript engine and media pipeline differences across hardware years. LG Content Store certification covers technical compliance, content metadata, and performance on representative hardware. App updates and patching are straightforward since the deployment model is web-based.

Roku channel development uses BrightScript (Roku's proprietary scripting language) and SceneGraph XML (the declarative UI framework). SceneGraph components: RowList and GridPanel for content browsing layouts, Video node for playback, Dialog for overlays, and custom composite nodes for brand-specific UI components. BrightScript handles business logic, API calls to your content catalogue or backend, authentication flows, and event handling.

Content delivery uses HLS adaptive streaming. PlayReady DRM for protected content is integrated via the ContentNode DRM fields and Roku's built-in DRM client, which handles licence acquisition from your licence server without requiring custom DRM code in BrightScript. Roku Direct Publisher is appropriate for simple MRSS-feed-based channels; SceneGraph channel development is appropriate for authenticated apps, custom UI, subscription billing, and any experience that goes beyond a content feed display. Roku Pay integration for subscription billing handles payment capture and renewal within the Roku platform, with server-side transaction validation via the Roku Web Services API. Roku Search registration makes your content discoverable via Roku's universal search. Certification submission requires passing Roku's channel certification checklist covering performance, deeplink handling, and content metadata compliance.

For OTT platforms and content businesses targeting multiple TV platforms simultaneously, we structure the build to maximise shared backend and content logic while maintaining platform-appropriate UI on each surface. The backend: a single content API serving platform-agnostic metadata (title, synopsis, artwork, stream URLs, DRM token endpoints) consumed by each platform's client. Artwork specifications differ (tvOS requires 1920x1080 top-shelf images, Roku requires specific poster ratios, Samsung and LG have their own asset specs), so the API serves platform-tagged artwork rather than one universal image set.

Authentication is handled via a single backend OAuth flow with platform-specific deep link callbacks for the activation flow. The "link on TV using a code" activation pattern (enter a code at a URL on your phone/laptop) is the standard UX for authenticated TV apps on all platforms; we implement the polling mechanism and expiry logic once in the backend and add the UI on each platform client. Analytics and playback event tracking uses a single analytics endpoint receiving standardised events from each platform, covering play start, buffer events, seek, pause, completion, and error codes. This gives a unified view of engagement across platforms without platform-specific analytics implementations. We scope multi-platform builds to identify which platforms to ship in the first release versus which to phase in, based on your audience distribution and budget.