Amazon has updated the Live TV menu on its connected television platform Fire TV to support more third-party apps and services, including DIRECTV and YouTube TV, the company announced this week.
The move comes as Amazon hopes more streamers will utilize Fire TV’s built-in menus to search for and discover things to watch across its own slate of apps and its ecosystem that supports thousands of third-party services.
Live TV already worked with a handful of streaming cable TV replacements like Dish Network’s Sling TV and Philo; adding DIRECTV and YouTube TV will allow more streaming pay TV subscribers to discover live content across hundreds of premium cable networks without having to launch separate apps.
Amazon is also preparing to introduce additional Alexa Plus (stylized as Alexa+) features on Fire TV beginning in November. The artificial intelligence-powered assistant will be able to draw on a viewer’s subscriptions and watch history when responding to entertainment-related questions and recommending programming.
The updates will roll out to Fire TV users in the United States later this year, with international availability expected early next year.
