You will soon be operating Android TV with your phones as a remote control

Google will soon make it possible for Android TV users to control their television without a remote control. Your smartphone can take over that task, also for Google TV. It will not work in the Netherlands at the moment, but it will already work in Belgium.

Smartphone as remote control

Everyone knows this feeling: you lie stretched out on the couch, only to discover that the remote control is painfully far away from you. Then you have to make choices. Are you going to leave your wonderful lying position to set up another program, or will you continue to enjoy yourself on the couch, but without the program you would like to see.

Google rids Android TV and Google TV users from such first worlddilemmas with a new feature for the Google TV app. You may be thinking, “What is the Google TV app”. Well, that is a successor to Google Play Movies, which is already available in the United States. Google TV will be able to find the new remote, which looks like a touchpad. One of the advantages is that your phone can also type faster with the keyboard compared to the TV remote. In addition, there will be a tile in the quick settings with which you can open the virtual remote control even faster.

availabilty

And that brings us to the less good news. It’s not surprising that you may not know the Google TV app. The app was not yet available in the Netherlands and Belgium. This will remain the case in the Netherlands for the time being, but Belgium is one of the 14 countries to which the app is expanding. In the coming weeks, Belgians will therefore find Google TV on their phone and in the Play Store.

We do not yet know when the app will also be available in the Netherlands, but it seems that Google is striving to roll it out worldwide. Another question is when Google will make its Chromecast with Google TV available in the Benelux. Provider KPN may have already revealed that such a launch is in any case on the schedule.

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