News app on Fire TV
A free, customizable news experience on Fire TV
[Updated 8/19/2020 with Black News Channel]
If you’re like me, you sometimes get overwhelmed trying to stay up to date on the news you care about. There’s a lot out there to watch, and it’s spread out across various channels and apps. Finding something you actually want to watch is like digging through piles of laundry for that missing sock. That’s why we are thrilled to announce the News app on Fire TV, a reimagined news experience that is free to watch, customizable, and makes it easy to watch news content from multiple providers in a single destination.
Over the coming weeks, you will see the app appear on your Fire TV home screen simply titled “News.” No download or subscription is required to enjoy this new feature; it’s a free experience supported by ads.
Getting started is easy. When you first open the app, you have the option to customize your experience. Simply select the news channels and content categories that you care about most. You can watch news clips and live feeds from popular news providers such as ABC News, CBS News, Bloomberg, HuffPost, Yahoo, Reuters, Entertainment Weekly, Black News Channel, and more. Then, the next time you want to watch the news, all you have to say is, “Alexa, play the news,” and it will automatically open the app and play content from your favorite channels.
Where can I find the app?
The News app will be automatically downloaded to your Fire TV device, and you should see it on your home screen in the ‘Your Apps and Channels’ row. This app will be available to Fire TV customers in the US over the next few weeks, so if you don’t see it right away, don’t worry, you will soon. In addition to the News app, there is also a dedicated News row on the Fire TV homescreen. Just scroll down a few rows and you will find a row titled News, with Live news and short news clips from different providers, ordered by recency.
Customize to your liking
It’s easy to customize your news experience based on your preferred news channels and the type of categories you care about most. When you open the app for the first time, you have the option to select your preferred news providers and even place them in the order in which you would like your news to play. For example, if you place HuffPost in the first spot and Reuters second, then every time you say “Alexa, play the news” or click on the app, you will see news auto-play from HuffPost first and Reuters second when you open the app.
Auto-play
Once you have completed customization, news from your preferred provider will automatically start playing and you can see all your channels under ‘My News’ in the order you selected during customization. Just sit back and enjoy different news stories as the next story automatically plays, just like a playlist.
Browse stories while watching
One of my favorite features lets you browse different stories without having to navigate away from the content you’re currently watching. Unlike traditional cable news, you can see what’s coming up, skip ahead, and more. Just click the down-select button on the remote and you will see a carousel of stories from the same channel. You can also use your voice to skip to the next story, pause, rewind, or fast-forward. Just say “Alexa, next story” or “Alexa, fast forward 10 secs.” Just ask Alexa by holding down the microphone button on your remote, speaking to a paired Echo device, or speaking to Fire TV Cube. You can also navigate to the next story by pressing the right or left on the Select button on your remote.
Live news, trending, & news by category
For those of you who just want to watch live news, there is a dedicated section for this in the app, called ‘Live.’ Here you’ll find live and breaking news coverage from ABC News Live, CBS News Live, and Yahoo News. We will be adding more Live channels before the end of the year. If you want to know what news is trending online, there is a dedicated section for trending stories and a section that has news broken into categories such as Politics, Tech, Finance, Business and Sports. We will be adding more categories over time.
Change your preferences anytime
Feel free to change your settings any time by going into the preferences section at the top where you can further customize by adding, removing, or re-ordering your channels.
What’s coming next
Soon you’ll be able to get the News app on your Fire tablet too. Enjoy at home or on-the-go, and enjoy the same great Alexa experience. Alexa will remember your content preferences for Fire TV and Fire Tablet. You can also expect to see more news providers, more categories, and additional Alexa features over time.
If you have any questions, feel free to tweet us @amazonfiretv or leave a comment below. Happy streaming!
