- TVOS 26 is officially published today, September 15, 2025
- A new look and new funny features
- Available for all Apple TV HD and 4K models
Good tvos 26 days to all those who celebrate it! Today is the day your Apple TV HD or Apple TV 4K obtains a brand new operating system, and because the iPhone, iPad and Mac are all updated also, it will have all your Apple kit and feels in the same Apple ecosystem.
I have been using the TVOS 26 developer and public beta for some time, and these five features are my current favorites. Please note, however, that not all features work on all older devices.
Look through liquid glass
Liquid Glass is Apple’s new design language, and this is Apple TV in a slightly less dramatic form than on iPhone or iPad: where the interfaces of these devices are now considerably different, the already modern Apple television design has been given more refreshment.
The main difference you will notice is the control center (which now seems as clear as that on an iPhone) and in FaceTime (which is more like the iOS application).
The new interface tries to move away as much as possible, allowing you to focus on the program or film rather than on transportation controls and additional options. This is exactly what you want with a television interface.
Airplay for anything
Apple TV and Airplay have been designed for the other, and TVOS 26 introduces a very welcome improvement: in the settings> Video and audio, you can now make AirPlay your default audio output for any Speaker Airplay, without having to name it again the next time you wake up your Apple TV from sleep.
A small change for sure, but a welcome for anyone who wanted to be able to use a pair of sound speakers as stereo television speakers, for example.
Karaoke mode
The Sing mode in Apple Music now works with your iPhone, allowing you to worry about your favorite backstreet boys songs (or if you are me, annoy your dog with an overly enthusiastic interpretation of Who let the dogs out? When she tries to sleep).
The association is just a question of scanning the QR code on the screen with your iPhone camera, and you can open the functionality from Apple music or using the dedicated Sing icon that appeared in your home screen.
Apple Music has a dedicated selection of song songs and reading lists, so it’s about finding the ones you want to scream. You can also allow a screen viewer to move with the music.
The Sing functionality is only for the Apple TV 4K 2022, and you must use the TV speakers, a sound bar or another wired system: it does not currently work if you publish towards wireless speakers.
Change the screen scene
When I saw the very first Apple TV, one of the things that impressed me most was the screen saver: Apple has always delivered very beautiful real scenes, including a breathtaking aerial photograph, and the collection has grown with each update of the operating system.
The TVOS 26 update is no exception, and in addition to new screen savering – this time from Indian sites, including Goa and Kerala – there is a new way to organize them.
In TVOS 26, you can personalize the air screen savers more than before. Not only can you hide the collections (s) that you do not want to see – for example, if you really like earth savering of the earth, but you are not so interested in the submarine collection – you can now do the same on a screen by screen.
Personalize your Apple TV with profiles
If you have a shared Apple TV, you probably already know the user profiles. TVOS makes them much easier to access, allowing you to have a profile selection screen when Apple TV wakes up (or bypass it and go directly to a specified profile each time).
The profiles will also become even more useful in TVOS 26, because Apple now allows developers to link their applications to specific Apple accounts, so that the profile to which you connect to Apple TV will also be the profile used for your different applications.
This should make the configuration of your Apple TV or the configuration of a new profile for the first time, much faster.
