On tvOS, third-party apps cannot read number key presses from a connected keyboard or remote (except inside a text field). There is also no HDMI-CEC API. Because of this, a live-TV / IPTV app cannot let the user simply type a channel number to change channels. This excludes a large group of users, especially older people. They have used numbered channels for their whole lives — they remember that a given number is a specific channel and just want to press that number to get there. It is the simplest and most familiar way for them to use a TV. Making them navigate an on-screen grid with the Siri Remote instead is much harder and unfamiliar for them. Please give apps a way to support numeric channel entry on tvOS — for example by letting apps receive number key presses (0–9) from a connected Bluetooth keyboard/keypad without forcing a text field, or by exposing the numeric keys from the TV's own remote via HDMI-CEC. Other TV platforms already pass number keys from the remote to apps, so this works for them today. tvOS does not, which leaves these users without a basic, expected way to use their TV.

I'm triaging the issue with the fast scrolling on UIScrollView and I'm really upset how little to no info this component is on the internet. Like i disabled scrolling and yet after holding the dpad down to scroll downward eventually the fast scroll mechanism is used. The issue I have is that I have a setup where the scrollview scrolling is disabled and whenever cells are focused it'll scroll to the cell's position for that cells to focused on top left side of the scrollview. I start off with the cell placed at position x of 1000. I scroll down enough to enable fast scrolling. While fast scrolling vertically, i press left a couple of time and it somewhat scroll horizontally. Actual scrollView index is suddenly placed to x:0 instead of let say x:950-1000 Expected should be scrolled to the left of cell at position x 1000. Attached the stack trace and the log showcasing it and run it on simulator tvos 26.2. Initial properties of the scrollview we set up scroll = [UIScrollView new]; scroll.contentInsetAdjustmentBehavior = UIScrollViewContentInsetAdjustmentNever; scroll.automaticallyAdjustsScrollIndicatorInsets = false; [scroll setDirectionalLockEnabled:TRUE]; [scroll setContentInset:UIEdgeInsetsMake(0, 0, 0, 0)]; scroll.bounces = FALSE; scroll.delaysContentTouches = FALSE; scroll.showsVerticalScrollIndicator = FALSE; scroll.showsHorizontalScrollIndicator = FALSE; The plan for me at least is to somehow disable the horizontal scrolling interaction of it when fast scrolling is enabled, without accessing the private components of it.

UIHostingConfiguration on tvOS: focus permanently broken with multiple focusable SwiftUI views Hi everyone, I'm working on a tvOS app with a UICollectionView. Some cells embed SwiftUI content via UIHostingConfiguration, specifically a row of 3 buttons that should be individually focusable. The cell itself returns canBecomeFocused = false so focus passes through to the SwiftUI buttons. The problem: after navigating focus into that section once, it becomes permanently unfocusable. Focus enters briefly, then immediately exits to nil on its own, without any user input. From that point on, the focus engine completely skips the section. The exact same SwiftUI view works perfectly when embedded via UIHostingController instead. How to reproduce Press DOWN to move focus into the UIHostingConfiguration section Focus lands on a SwiftUI button for a split second Focus exits on its own and bumps to another section The section is now dead, focus skips it on every subsequent navigation What the system logs say (-UIFocusLoggingEnabled YES) Right when focus enters, the system reports the SwiftUI focus items as "disappearing": Ignoring focus update request for disappearing focus environment <UIKitFocusSectionResponderItem> Then when searching for a new focusable item: <SwiftUI._UIInheritedView> → (warning) No focusable items found. <UIHostingContentView> → (warning) No focusable items found. === unable to find focused item in context. retrying with updated request. === The views are still in the hierarchy (verified by pointer), but the UIHostingContentView no longer exposes its virtual focus items. I also see mismatched parentFocusEnvironment on those items, pointing to a _UIHostingView from a completely different cell. What I've tried I've spent a lot of time on this with my colleagues, dug through the very limited documentation available online, and even used AI agents to help brainstorm. We tested 10 different approaches, none worked: Overriding preferredFocusEnvironments to point to the UIHostingContentView setNeedsFocusUpdate() / updateFocusIfNeeded(), rescan finds nothing Forcing UIKit redraws (setNeedsLayout, setNeedsDisplay) Removing .focusSection() Removing all SwiftUI animations, identical behavior Using canFocusItemAt: delegate instead of cell subclass, identical remembersLastFocusedIndexPath = true, causes a separate focus trap configurationUpdateHandler + setNeedsUpdateConfiguration(), config is rebuilt but virtual items stay deregistered Verified the UIHostingContentView never leaves the hierarchy. It doesn't, its internal state is just corrupted My workaround I switched to UIHostingController with proper view controller containment. It works because the hosting controller is a full UIFocusEnvironment, so the focus engine can traverse it and it correctly maintains its virtual items. Has anyone encountered this? Is there a known pattern for using UIHostingConfiguration on tvOS with multiple focusable SwiftUI elements? Or should I just file a Feedback? Thanks for any help! You can find the code here : https://github.com/ThomasDutartre/focus-problem-tvos I recored the problem here : https://youtu.be/yPfM5AvU2ko

UIHostingConfiguration on tvOS: focus permanently broken with multiple focusable SwiftUI views Hi everyone, I'm working on a tvOS app with a UICollectionView. Some cells embed SwiftUI content via UIHostingConfiguration, specifically a row of 3 buttons that should be individually focusable. The cell itself returns canBecomeFocused = false so focus passes through to the SwiftUI buttons. The problem: after navigating focus into that section once, it becomes permanently unfocusable. Focus enters briefly, then immediately exits to nil on its own, without any user input. From that point on, the focus engine completely skips the section. The exact same SwiftUI view works perfectly when embedded via UIHostingController instead. How to reproduce Press DOWN to move focus into the UIHostingConfiguration section Focus lands on a SwiftUI button for a split second Focus exits on its own and bumps to another section The section is now dead, focus skips it on every subsequent navigation What the system logs say (-UIFocusLoggingEnabled YES) Right when focus enters, the system reports the SwiftUI focus items as "disappearing": Ignoring focus update request for disappearing focus environment <UIKitFocusSectionResponderItem> Then when searching for a new focusable item: <SwiftUI._UIInheritedView> → (warning) No focusable items found. <UIHostingContentView> → (warning) No focusable items found. === unable to find focused item in context. retrying with updated request. === The views are still in the hierarchy (verified by pointer), but the UIHostingContentView no longer exposes its virtual focus items. I also see mismatched parentFocusEnvironment on those items, pointing to a _UIHostingView from a completely different cell. What I've tried I've spent a lot of time on this with my colleagues, dug through the very limited documentation available online, and even used AI agents to help brainstorm. We tested 10 different approaches, none worked: Overriding preferredFocusEnvironments to point to the UIHostingContentView setNeedsFocusUpdate() / updateFocusIfNeeded(), rescan finds nothing Forcing UIKit redraws (setNeedsLayout, setNeedsDisplay) Removing .focusSection() Removing all SwiftUI animations, identical behavior Using canFocusItemAt: delegate instead of cell subclass, identical remembersLastFocusedIndexPath = true, causes a separate focus trap configurationUpdateHandler + setNeedsUpdateConfiguration(), config is rebuilt but virtual items stay deregistered Verified the UIHostingContentView never leaves the hierarchy. It doesn't, its internal state is just corrupted My workaround I switched to UIHostingController with proper view controller containment. It works because the hosting controller is a full UIFocusEnvironment, so the focus engine can traverse it and it correctly maintains its virtual items. Has anyone encountered this? Is there a known pattern for using UIHostingConfiguration on tvOS with multiple focusable SwiftUI elements? Or should I just file a Feedback? Thanks for any help!

Hello everyone, Following the WWDC 2025 announcement of tvOS 26 and the introduction of the new Liquid Glass effect, Apple published a press release mentioning that Liquid Glass is "available on Apple TV 4K (2nd generation and later)". This seems to exclude both the Apple TV HD and the 1st generation Apple TV 4K, even though both devices remain compatible with tvOS 26. Source: Apple Newsroom ( https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2025/06/apple-tv-brings-a-beautiful-redesign-and-enhanced-home-entertainment-experience ) I’m wondering: Will using UIGlassEffect or glassEffect(_:in:) on these older devices cause a crash? If not, will the effect fall back to a simple blur, or render as fully transparent? Is there an API or recommended way to detect whether the Liquid Glass effect is supported on the current device? Thanks in advance for your insights!

We are developing an iPad app which also needs to control apple TV. is there any lead for it, any sdk/library available for quick and easy integration.

I found a memory leak in tvOS 17.4, but it's not happening in tvOS 18.0 here is the code flow 1.I have controller inside which I have tableView which in turn contains a collectionview here I have passed self to tableViewcell as delegate and then from tableview cell I have passed self again as delegate to collectionViewcell, but memory is not released, because self is retained "I have passed self as weak every where still memory leak is happening only in tvOS 17.4 and below versions. but in 18.0 and above versions it's fine"

Description I'm developing a tvOS application where I utilize a UISearchController embedded within a UISearchContainerViewController for search functionality. In a particular flow, a custom view controller contains a TVDigitEntryViewController as a child, with its modalPresentationStyle set to .blurOverFullScreen. The issue arises when a user initiates the PIN entry but decides to cancel and return to the search interface without entering a PIN. Upon returning, the search keyboard is no longer visible, and attempts to focus or interact with it are unsuccessful. Steps to Reproduce Initialize and present a UISearchContainerViewController that contains a UISearchController with a results view controller. Within the search results, present a custom view controller containing TVDigitEntryViewController as a child, setting its modalPresentationStyle to .blurOverFullScreen. Dismiss the custom view controller without entering a PIN (e.g., by pressing the Menu button on the remote). Observe that upon returning to the search interface, the keyboard is missing, and focus interactions are unresponsive. Observed Behavior After dismissing the custom view controller with TVDigitEntryViewController, the search keyboard does not reappear, and the focus system seems to lose track of the search input field. Expected Behavior The search keyboard should remain visible and functional after dismissing the custom view controller, allowing users to continue their search without interruption. Additional Context I have reviewed the TVDigitEntryViewController documentation (developer.apple.com) and related discussions on the Apple Developer Forums but have not found a solution to this specific issue. Questions Has anyone encountered a similar issue or have insights into why the search keyboard becomes unresponsive after dismissing a .blurOverFullScreen modal with a child TVDigitEntryViewController? Are there recommended practices to ensure the search keyboard remains active and focusable after such modal presentations? Any guidance or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!

I'm running into a problem with the focus order in my UICollectionView in my tvOS app. The layout of my app is outlined in the following diagram On the uppermost layer I have a UITableView, each cell containing a single UICollectionView that can contain a variable number of UICollectionViewCells. When the user swipes down, I want the left-most item in the next row down to be selected, as follows: I've been able to get this to work for the majority of cases. The exception is when the previously focused item extends to the length of the screen - in this case the next focused item isn't the leftmost item, but rather the center item, as follows. Using focus guides won't really fit the use case here since collection views are dynamically generated. I've found that there is a function in UICollectionViewDelegate, indexPathForPreferredFocusedView that should help here but it only seems to be called intermittedly, even though I have set remembersLastFocusedIndexPath on the collectionview to true. I can force it to be called by calling setNeedsFocusUpdate() but I can't figure out a good place to call it - shouldUpdateFocus is too early and didUpdateFocus is too late. Is there some way to constrain the focus area of a view to a certain subset of it's frame - for example, the left-most quarter of its width? Or does anyone know of some other solution to this problem?

Hello, I've upgraded both of my Apple TVs to tvOS 18. Since then, my app developed with SwiftUI has become almost unusable due to severe lag, particularly when scrolling in a LazyVStack. On the A1625 (Apple TV HD), the lag can last up to 20 seconds, while on the A2843 (Apple TV 4K, 3rd generation, Wi-Fi + Ethernet), it’s about one second. I can consistently reproduce the issue with this minimal example: @main struct MyApp: App { var body: some Scene { WindowGroup { ScrollView { LazyVStack { ForEach(0..<1000) { nb in Button("Item \(nb)") {} } } } } } } Using Instruments, I found that the hang is related to this call: 389.00 ms 71,4 % 6.00 ms +[_UIFocusRegionEvaluator __regionsByEvaluatingOcclusionsForBaseRegions:occludingRegions:baseRegionsCanOccludeEachOther:inSnapshot:] Unfortunately, I can't attach the Instruments trace directly here, but you can download it from this link: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1sEIwXhr7_ajjRHZevCIW6jNOlPjaeU6L/view?usp=sharing Important notes: The same screen, when written in UIKit, runs smoothly on both devices. After performing a factory reset on the older device, the performance issue disappeared. However, as you can imagine, I’m already receiving complaints from users who are understandably unwilling to reset their devices. Does anyone know of a workaround until this is addressed by Apple?

I'm creating a Netflix like app on tvOS, here is my compositional layout that I use with my collectionView. private func createLayout() -> UICollectionViewCompositionalLayout { return UICollectionViewCompositionalLayout { (section, _) -> NSCollectionLayoutSection? in // item let itemSize = NSCollectionLayoutSize(widthDimension: .fractionalWidth(1), heightDimension: .fractionalHeight(1.0)) let item = NSCollectionLayoutItem(layoutSize: itemSize) item.contentInsets = NSDirectionalEdgeInsets(top: 0, leading: 10, bottom: 0, trailing: 10) // group let groupSize = NSCollectionLayoutSize(widthDimension: .fractionalWidth(1/5), heightDimension: .estimated(350)) let group = NSCollectionLayoutGroup.horizontal(layoutSize: groupSize, subitems: [item]) // section let section = NSCollectionLayoutSection(group: group) section.orthogonalScrollingBehavior = .groupPaging let headerSize = NSCollectionLayoutSize(widthDimension: .fractionalWidth(1.0), heightDimension: .estimated(UIFont(name: "MyFont", size: 36)!.lineHeight)) let sectionHeader = NSCollectionLayoutBoundarySupplementaryItem( layoutSize: headerSize, elementKind: "SectionHeader", alignment: .top) section.boundarySupplementaryItems = [sectionHeader] section.contentInsets = NSDirectionalEdgeInsets(top: 0, leading: 20, bottom: 30, trailing: 0) return section } } So: My collection view is composed by several row (that are the sections). Each section is composed by groups containing 1 item each. Each section can be scrolled horizontally. And you can scroll vertically to move from a section to an other. I'm expecting to have the following behavior when scrolling: Horizontal scrolling: Before focus shifts -------------------------- | vA vB vC vD vE | | [v1] v2 v3 v4 v5 | | vU vW vX vY vZ | -------------------------- After focus shifts -------------------------- | vA vB vC vD vE | | [v2] v3 v4 v5 v6 | | vU vW vX vY vZ | -------------------------- Vertical scroll: Before focus shifts -------------------------- | [vA] vB vC vD vE | | v1 v2 v3 v4 v5 | | vU vW vX vY vZ | -------------------------- After focus shifts -------------------------- | [v1] v2 v3 v4 v5 | | vU vW vX vY vZ | | vF vG vH vI vJ | -------------------------- Thanks to section.orthogonalScrollingBehavior = .groupPaging the horizontal scrolling is working as expected. (I've put 1 item per group to achieve this) But I'm going crazy with the vertical scroll, I'm not able to achieve it as expected, the focused section still centered verticaly on the screen ! What I'm getting: Before focus shifts -------------------------- | [vA] vB vC vD vE | | v1 v2 v3 v4 v5 | | vU vW vX vY vZ | -------------------------- After focus shifts -------------------------- | vA vB vC vD vE | | [v1] v2 v3 v4 v5 | | vU vW vX vY vZ | -------------------------- After an other focus shifts -------------------------- | v1 v2 v3 v4 v5 | | [vU] vW vX vY vZ | | vF vG vH vI vJ | -------------------------- I've tried to play with the didUpdateFocusIn function without success func collectionView(_ collectionView: UICollectionView, didUpdateFocusIn context: UICollectionViewFocusUpdateContext, with coordinator: UIFocusAnimationCoordinator) { if let nextFocusedItemIndexPath = context.nextFocusedIndexPath { let section = nextFocusedItemIndexPath.section let sectionIndexPath = IndexPath(item: 0, section: section) collectionView.scrollToItem(at: sectionIndexPath, at: .top, animated: true) } } The collectionview is behaving strangely when using the didUpdateFocusIn function and I feel it's not the good way to perform what I'm expecting... I've also try to play with the scrollViewWillEndDragging function without success func scrollViewWillEndDragging(_ scrollView: UIScrollView, withVelocity velocity: CGPoint, targetContentOffset: } Everything that I tried looks like a hack and I can't believe Apple has not plan something for this use case, which is in my sense a common use case....

We noticed that AVPlayerViewController does not always show the "Multi-channel" label in the audio setting in the player when playing a video asset with surround sound as an audio track. (see image) We only serve in the HLS master manifest a multichannel audio track, like this #EXT-X-MEDIA:TYPE=AUDIO,GROUP-ID="audio_0",CHANNELS="6",NAME="Surround",LANGUAGE.... Different tvOS versions will give us different outcomes on whether or not the "multi-channel" label is shown DOES NOT SHOW (the label Multi-channel will not show) Model A1842 (tvOS v 17.5.1) Model A1625 (tvOS v 16.6) DOES SHOW (see image) Model A1625 (tvOS v 15.6) This gives us the impression that the label being shown depends on tvOS version.. Any reason why? This is an ideal way for the user to see that the audio track has surround..

I have a tvOS project contains an App target and 3 static libraries: EntryPoint – Static library that contains main , AppDelegate and SceneDelegate Experience – Static library containing my UI elements AppTarget – executable built using above two libraries I have a class "SelectionTable" which subclasses UITableView in Experience target : import UIKit class SelectionTable : UITableView { private var vDataSrc:[String]! func SetDataSrc (_ pDataSrc:[String]) { self.vDataSrc = pDataSrc } func UpdateDataSrc (_ pStringList:[String]) { self.vDataSrc += pStringList } func GetDataSrc () -> [String] { return self.vDataSrc } } I am not using this class anywhere and still i am getting these errors when i build my AppTarget: Cannot find interface declaration for 'UITableView', superclass of 'SelectionTable' Expected a type These above error are coming in generated header file "Experience-Swift.h". This file is auto-generated by compiler. I am not using @objc anywhere in the code, But still the Target-Swift.h file has the below lines: SWIFT_CLASS("_TtC10Experience22SelectionTable") @interface SelectionTable : UITableView - (nonnull instancetype)initWithFrame:(CGRect)frame style:(UITableViewStyle)style OBJC_DESIGNATED_INITIALIZER; - (nullable instancetype)initWithCoder:(NSCoder * _Nonnull)coder OBJC_DESIGNATED_INITIALIZER; @end When i am marking above class as Private , this error goes away . And also , if i am defining SelectionTable class in EntryPoint library , this error does not occur . I am using similar model for an iOS project also and there i am not facing this issue. I am using :- Swift version : Swift 5.9.2 XCode version : 15.2

The alertController.view.tintColor = .yellow statement does not seem to take effect in TVOS 17 when creating alerts. Interestingly, when using the same alert code on TVOS 16, the specified color is applied successfully. I'm seeking assistance in resolving this discrepancy and would appreciate any guidance or solutions you can provide. I could understand that the Alert design aswell is modified which is not mentioned in the release notes of TVOS 17. Please help me out here. TVOS 17: TVOS 16:

We have developed an Apple TV application with a Hebrew (RTL layout) interface. The application utilizes a Swift-based Digit Entry view controller for pin entry. However, we are encountering an issue where the numeric keyboard numbers overlap with the backspace class TVDigitEntryViewController : UIViewController The problem specifically occurs when the Apple TV language is set to English, while the application language is set to Hebrew with RTL layout. As a result, the number 1 from the numeric keyboard is hidden behind the backspace button, as shown in the attached image. We are seeking a solution or suggestions on how to resolve this issue and ensure that the numeric keyboard is properly aligned with the backspace button in our Hebrew Apple TV application.

Hi! I searched around but could not find any recent references on AppleTV planning to support HTML/Webview. Does anyone have any updates about this, if Apple is planning to add support to HTML/WKWebView in the near future? Thanks!

how do I put the app i am developing on my apple th for testing?my apple tv is the latest 4K model.

I'm working on TVOS with new Remote and wanted to change the behavior of UIPress.PressType.leftArrow but couldn't found a solution so far. Here is my testing code to disable the buttons, but the buttons are still working Please, advise me to solve the problem class MyScrollView: UIScrollView {  override var canBecomeFocused: Bool { true }  override init(frame: CGRect) {   super.init(frame: frame)  }  required init?(coder: NSCoder) {   fatalError("init(coder:) has not been implemented")  }  override func pressesBegan(_ presses: Set<UIPress>, with event: UIPressesEvent?) {   print("\(type(of: self))::\(#function)")  }  override func pressesEnded(_ presses: Set<UIPress>, with event: UIPressesEvent?) {   print("\(type(of: self))::\(#function)")  }  override func pressesCancelled(_ presses: Set<UIPress>, with event: UIPressesEvent?) {   print("\(type(of: self))::\(#function)")  } } class ContainerView: UIView {  override init(frame: CGRect) {   super.init(frame: frame)  }  required init?(coder: NSCoder) {   fatalError("init(coder:) has not been implemented")  }  override func pressesBegan(_ presses: Set<UIPress>, with event: UIPressesEvent?) {   print("\(type(of: self))::\(#function)")  }  override func pressesEnded(_ presses: Set<UIPress>, with event: UIPressesEvent?) {   print("\(type(of: self))::\(#function)")  }  override func pressesCancelled(_ presses: Set<UIPress>, with event: UIPressesEvent?) {   print("\(type(of: self))::\(#function)")  } } class ViewController: UIViewController {  let scrollView = MyScrollView()  let contentView = ContainerView()  override func viewDidLoad() {   super.viewDidLoad() //  // Do any additional setup after loading the view.   scrollView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false   contentView.translatesAutoresizingMaskIntoConstraints = false   view.addSubview(scrollView)   NSLayoutConstraint.activate([    scrollView.leftAnchor.constraint(equalTo: self.view.leftAnchor, constant: 5),    scrollView.rightAnchor.constraint(equalTo: self.view.rightAnchor, constant: 5),    scrollView.centerYAnchor.constraint(equalTo: self.view.centerYAnchor),    scrollView.heightAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 100)   ])   scrollView.addSubview(contentView)   NSLayoutConstraint.activate([    contentView.topAnchor.constraint(equalTo: scrollView.topAnchor),    contentView.bottomAnchor.constraint(equalTo: scrollView.bottomAnchor),    contentView.leadingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: scrollView.leadingAnchor),    contentView.trailingAnchor.constraint(equalTo: scrollView.trailingAnchor),    contentView.heightAnchor.constraint(equalTo: scrollView.heightAnchor),    contentView.widthAnchor.constraint(equalToConstant: 6400)   ])   contentView.backgroundColor = UIColor.red.withAlphaComponent(0.5)   scrollView.panGestureRecognizer.allowedTouchTypes = [    NSNumber(value: UITouch.TouchType.indirect.rawValue)   ]   scrollView.panGestureRecognizer.allowedPressTypes = []  }  override func viewDidLayoutSubviews() {   super.viewDidLayoutSubviews()   scrollView.contentInset = UIEdgeInsets(top: 0,                       left: scrollView.bounds.width / 2,                       bottom: 0,                       right: scrollView.bounds.width / 2)  } }

I am attempting to detect changes of a UISlider value using the observer option but I am not getting any output. Selected parts of code here class MainViewController: UIViewController {     @IBOutlet weak var speedSlider: UISlider!     var speedSliderObserver:  NSKeyValueObservation?     override func viewDidLoad() {   super.viewDidLoad()         setSettings()     }     func setSettings() {         speedSliderObserver = speedSlider.observe(.value, options: [.old, .new]) { object, change in             print("speedSlider from: (change.oldValue!), to: (change.newValue!)")         } } Am I using observe correctly or is there some other way?

Based on documentation, I would assume item scanning in Accessibility mode's Switch Control utilizes the underlying API - Focus-based Navigation from UI Kit (please correct me if I'm wrong). Where is the documentation for the other type of scanning it shows in the above link, point scanning? Thanks.