• General
  • Q: What is TVirl?
  • Q: Which IPTV service is used by TVirl?
• Download and installation
  • TVirl's requirements
  • Q: How I can download TVirl?
  • Q: Can you provide APK to download?
  • Q: How I can download beta version?
  • Q: How I can join alpha testing?
• Devices and Compatibility
  • Q: What devices work with TVirl?
  • Q: Why I cannot download TVirl from Play Store for my Android TV Box?
  • Q: Can I use TVirl with Amazon Fire TV?
  • Q: Why TVirl can't work with other Android devices?
  • Q: Any chances to get it working on my box/Fire TV?
• Initial setup
• Interface
  • Q: Why does it look different on screenshots compared to my TV?
  • Q: Please change 'element X' (EPG, Channel info top bar, ...) in the interface
• Subscriptions
  • Q: What's the difference between 'Plus' and 'Supporter'?
  • Q: What's included with subscriptions?
• TVirl development
  • Q: Is TVrl open-sourced?
  • Q: How I can contribute to TVirl development?
  • Q: Is TVirl translated to my language?
• Playlists and M3U tags
  • Q: Which playlists are supported?
  • Q: Why do channel titles have abra-cadabra?
• Features
  • Q: Does TVirl support automatic playlist/EPG update?
  • Q: Does TVirl support channels grouping?
  • Q: Does TVirl support custom HTTP headers?
  • Q: Does TVirl support catch-up?
• EPG formats
• Android TV features support
  • Q: Does TVirl support HOME screen integration?
  • Q: Does TVirl support parental control or content rating?
  • Q: What is Tunneled playback?
• Issues
  • Q: Channel 'X' I have in my playlist is missing
  • Q: Why aren't my channels aren't grouped into categories?

TVirl is "TV Input Service" app for Android TV, which integrates IPTV playlists to Android TV system's TV App.

TVirl is not standalone application, and it works inside system's TV App like Live Channels from Google.

If your device does not have it (or replacement in case of Sony/Philips/TCL/MiTV) pre-installed, please install it from Play Store.

TVirl does not provide any IPTV service by itself. But any service with playlists in M3U format you own can be used with TVirl.

• Android TV device.
• Live Channels app installed or it's analogue from OEM (Sony/Philips). In most cases it's pre-installed but hidden from the launcher before TVirl or other "TV input service" is installed.

You can download TVirl from Play Store

Available via ApkMirror.

Please prefer installation from Play Store. If PlayStore says that your device is not supported – most probably your device is not "Android TV" and TVirl cannot work without additional device preparations. Please read Devices and Compatibility section.

You can join Beta testing program via TVirl's testing page in Play Store

To join alpha testing - please send error report with logs attached (mandatory) from TVirl's settings. After getting confirmation that you are successfully added you will start getting alpha builds from Play Store.

All Android TV devices are supported. Please note, that Android TV is special variant of Android and it is different from mobile version of Android.

Most popular devices are:

• NVidia Shield;
• Xiaomi MiBox, MiBox S (International version), MiTV Stick;
• Chromecast with Google TV
• Sony TVs with Android TV;
• Philips TVs;
• ... check other devices on https://www.android.com/tv/

Most probably your device does not use Android TV (special variant of Android) but mobile version of Android instead. There are a lot of "android tv boxes" which are "tv boxes" with mobile version of Android.

Please check how to bypass Amazon restrictions and get TVirl working with Fire OS Live TV app.

Android TV provides additional applications and services which are missing from other Android variants:

• Tv Input Framework;
• TV App (like Live Channels from Google).

Technically speaking if TV App like "Live Channels" and related "live tv" services are installed on device – TVirl will work.

You can search if there is any custom firmware for your device.

Another option is TVStock from https://opengapps.org/

⚠️ Please perform any device modifications on your own risk!

Before initial playlist installation system TV app (Live Channels or it's replacement) should be opened at least once. TVirl will open it automatically.

If there is no pre-installed TV App on device or TVirl fails to open it - please install it first (TVirl's requirements).

Different OEMs provide different TV apps on their devices. For example NVidia Shield and Xiaomi MiBox use standard TV app from Google (Live Channels), while Sony and Philips provide their own implementation of TV App with their own interface.

It's not possible.

TVirl works inside system TV App and the whole interface is provided by this app. On top of that different systems have different UI:

• Sony:
  
• NVidia Shield with Live Channels from Google:
  

"Plus" is a fully functional subscription which unlocks all additional features available in TVirl.

"Supporter" is purely a voluntary contribution if you have enjoyed my work and want to support TVirl's further development. As my "Thank You" you will get early preview access to all new features while they are in development.

"Plus" started with Automatic update of playlist/EPG, but there are other features planned for subscribers.

No, TVirl is not open sourced.

• TVirl localization
• FAQ translation
• Sony-specific screenshots/gifs for this FAQ

TVirl is already translated to:

• English;
• Russian;
• Arabic;
• Chinese Simplified;
• Dutch;
• French;
• Italian;
• Polish;
• Portuguese;
• Slovenian;
• Spanish;
• Swedish;
• Turkish;
• Ukrainian;
• Vietnamese;
• and partially for some other languages (Bulgarian, German, Latvian, Lithuanian).

Localization project is public and anyone can contribute to it (registration is required).

TVirl supports playlists in M3U format. Please check M3U-dedicated wiki about tags and attributes supported by TVirl.

Most probably your playlist uses non-UTF8 encoding. How to fix?

• Select proper encoding from playlist settings during playlist installation:
  
• (OR) Convert your playlist file to use UTF-8. Edit the playlist using editor like Notepad++ or Sublime Text, save your playlist with UTF-8 encoding and install playlist once again.
  

Yes. It's available with Plus Subscription

Since TVirl is integrated to system TV App it has all limitations system (and TV Input Framework) applies:

• Grouping works per-program. So if there are no programs in EPG – grouping won't work.
• Android TV provides only GENRES grouping
• Android TV allows GENRES only from it's canonical list of genres (upper-cased!)
• Only some TV Apps support grouping. Live Channels does it, but Sony’s TV App does not.

Supported M3U tags:

#EXTINF:-1 group-title="MOVIES", Best Movies
https://example.com/best.m3u8

#EXTINF:-1 groups="MOVIES|COMEDY", Best Movies 2
https://example.com/best2.m3u8

#EXTINF:-1, Best Music
#EXTGRP:MUSIC
https://example.com/best3.m3u8

This is how genres grouping works in Live Channels:

You can specify custom User-Agent for all streams in TVirl Network settings.

TVirl supports different syntaxes to specify custom HTTP headers for all channels in a playlist or for each channel individually. Please check it in M3U-dedicated wiki.

Starting from 0.5.0.0 TVirl supports catch-up types:

• default
• append
• shift
• flussonic

TVirl implements next Android TV features to integrate catch-up to system TV App:

• Time-shift support. Ability to pause/resume playback or seek to the start of a current or archived program.
  
• Recording. Ability to add current program (from the current moment)
  or future program to DVR.
  And play it later.
  Please note, that all "recorded" catch-up programs are not locally stored, but available from IPTV service during limited timed (usually 1, 3 or 7 days).
• Program;s archive. All available archive programs for a currently playing channel can be automatically added to DVR. Please check Settings > Catch-up > "Automatically add to DVR" preferences.

Please check next video showcasing catch-up integration:

TVirl supports:

• XmlTv (plain or packed to zip, gz). For example: epg.xml, epg.xml.zip, epg.xml.gz.
• JTV (ndx+pdt files packed to zip)
• Logo archive with images in png, jpg formats inside it.

Yes, TVirl supports playback of DRM-protected (Widevine, PlayReady, ClearKey) streams. Please check supported syntax in M3U-dedicated wiki

TVirl adds recently watched channels to HOME screen starting from version 0.5.3.0.

On Android TV with version prior 8.0 all recommendations go to single row.

TVirl supports PIN code for channels. You can add it to any channel. Please choose Settings TV > Parents Control.

...

"Tunneled video playback" (Documentation on https://source.android.com) is optional feature intended for Android TVs which can bring better audio/video synchronization (AV sync) and smoother playback on TVs which support it.

Devices which support tunneled playback (have proper system decoders) are:

• Sony TV.

TVirl supports it starting with 0.4.2.0 and it can be enabled in settings: Settings > Playback > Expert > Decoders > "Tunneled playback"

Android TV automatically disables newly added channels except initial playlist installation. You have to enable them on your own from a TV app (Live Channels) or system settings (Sony)

TVirl supports grouping in the way Android TV allows it to, but it's different from grouping implemented in standalone apps. Read about Genres grouping.