Watch on TV, and the phone as a remote
Pair a phone with a television once and two things become possible.
Watch on TV
Section titled “Watch on TV”Find something on the phone, press Watch on TV, and it starts on the television, from the position you stopped at, decoded by the television itself.
It works with live channels, films, single episodes and whole multiview layouts.
If the box is asleep, the same tap wakes it over your own network and waits for it to come up. Nothing is streamed through the phone, so nothing is re-encoded and nothing drops when you lock it.
The phone as a remote
Section titled “The phone as a remote”Settings → Devices, then tap your television under Your devices. You get a full D-pad plus play, pause, seek, channel up and down, and volume.
Whatever the television is playing shows up on the phone, so you can pause it or change channel from there without looking for the real remote.
The controls light up once the television has checked in. A television that has never checked in says so; one that is asleep offers a power button.
Pairing them
Section titled “Pairing them”The television shows a QR code and a short code when you sign in on it and under Settings → Playlists → Add a playlist. Scan the QR code with the phone, or type the code in Settings → Devices → Connect a device. It works the other way round too: Show this device’s code on the phone, and type it on the television under Settings → Devices → Connect a device. Which way round depends on which device has your playlists already.
Pairing does three jobs at once:
- signs the television in to your account, without typing a password on a remote,
- carries your playlists and their provider passwords across, encrypted end to end,
- carries which playlists you had open, and which categories you had trimmed.
The details are on Moving to another device.
Sending things later
Section titled “Sending things later”Once paired, the send button next to a device in Settings → Devices sends more at any time: a playlist, your category selections, and your TMDB and OpenSubtitles sign-ins. Each send asks what the receiving device should do with it, and Leave the TV as it is is always one of the answers.
What it needs
Section titled “What it needs”Both devices signed in to the same account, on the same network for the wake-up to work. Phone-to-phone works the same way as phone-to-television.