News Analysis
When AT&T’s DIRECTV Now launched on November 30, some industry observers were surprised that the service was not available on Roku, the leading maker of streaming devices. The live streaming service was (and is) on Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV, but not Roku.
See Amazon’s Fire TV streaming devices.
Roku said at the time that it would add DIRECTV Now sometime in the first quarter, but there are just a few weeks left in the time period and, as of this morning, still no Roku.
The omission has some Roku owners upset and they have voiced their concerns on social media sites.
“It was supposed to be ‘early Q1’, they must be having a lot of issues with the #Roku support,” writes @DJ_Tweets_MN on Twitter.
DJ might be right. DIRECTV Now has famously struggled in the early going, undergoing everything from outages to login issues to accidental blackouts of sporting events to picture freezing. Perhaps DIRECTV Now is having difficulty coordinating with Roku to develop a stable app that will not trigger more technical snafus.
But I think the larger issue is that DIRECTV Now has been afraid that the addition of Roku will significantly increase subscribers, and that could lead to more technical snafus. AT&T executives have said the early errors have been caused in part to a larger number of subscribers than the company anticipated. They simply weren’t ready to handle the traffic, although they don’t quite phrase it that way.
Amazon: Roku Premiere Plus: $96.
So DIRECTV Now may still be coming to Roku by month’s end. But my guess is that AT&T will not sign-off until it’s sure it can handle the extra traffic.
— Phillip Swann
I have complained numerous times to both AT&T and Roku management about the Roku delay to no avail. If they are worried about extra traffic, they should roll out Roku to current customers only in some kind of “beta” program.
Another good questions is, “Sling TV: Where is Fox News?”
100% agree… WHERE IS FOX News on Sling? AND all the Discoveries channels (TLC!!!)????
Prepaid for 3 months to get AppleTV since it wasn’t available on my Roku. Gosh, I hate that AppleTV. It’s a horrible UI compared to Roku. Experience with DirectTV Now is mixed. I think Sling has a better UI, but DTV has better programming for the price.
That’s why I just left. They really didn’t even care or tried enough… I kept sling
Sling is my callback, but at $35/mo, DTVN covers my two sets. Sling would require multiple subs. 2 to 3 weeks and I’ll either have DTVN and Roku – or Sling.
need Roku.hate appletv.AND WHERE IS ABC FOR DALLAS TX?
Yes I agree, picked up the free Apple tv. It is horrible compared to Roku. How long must we wait.
Roku is coming to directvnow very soon and to where is ABC in dallas….use the search bar and search for ABC. It has moved in the guide but still available.
If AT&T does not support Roku soon to acquire and hold roku customers before Hulu or You tube tv streaming service come out they are going to lose them for good. They better have a good promotion for roku owners.
Jannie Stiles, are you speaking with knowledge of an actual date or just parroting the AT&T/DTVN “party line?”
I’m glad I quit #DirectvNever. Their customer service is still one of the worst EVER. They do not apologize for their mistakes and treat you only like a number not a human. #DirectvNow is horrid.
If you use Roku on second home TV, do you pay extra charge?
An interesting thing I’ve noticed the past few months are the references to freezing screens, buffering issues, channel problems, etc. Maybe I’m just lucky, but we’ve had it since January without any real issues. It buffered five seconds or so three times, but so did Sling. That’s been about it. Our experience has been positive. Great service. I do, however, prefer Sling’s UI, and I prefer Roku to AppleTV also.
No Roku NO service….tired of waiting
I have both a Roku 3 and the free Apple TV that I got from DirecTV Now. I use the Apple TV for everything except Amazon Prime and Vudu, which aren’t supported. I don’t think DirecTV is holding back to keep subscribers down; it won’t get a big boost just by adding Roku, since it has stopped the super opening promotions – $35 for Go Big and the free Apple TV, plus the free HBO for a year – all of those don’t apply to new subscribers.
I love my FIRE TV so much more than my ROKU. I bought the Fire TV to use with Playstation Vue becuase Vue sucks with the ROKU OS. Well worth the money. Then Viacom dropped from Vue and DIrecTV NOW launched shortly after. DirecTV Now got me due to 3 factors. 1. $35 for 100 channels as long as I stay. 2. Viacom Channels – a couple of them are musts for me (I’m willing to wait for DVR, but if HULU gets Viacom Channels before DirecTV Now gets DVR that will change). 3. DirecTV Now just gave me, and everyone who signed up before Marc h 6th, HBO FREE for one full year. Done…. DirecTV Now… you win… but you better get that DVR before HULU Live Streaming gets Viacom on board.
I’m going to stick with sling and cancel direct tv.
This is some BS that needs to be fixed
I’m getting fed up with DTV Now. The Fire Stick is HORRID. I have to restart it before I begin a DTV Now session, or it will hang, or the WiFi will go stupid, and crash the stick. CrApple TV is a joke. Only reason I haven’t cancelled yet is because of the Go Big promotion, and the HBO free for a year, but…my bill is the same this month, a week after I got the email about the free HBO. If it doesn’t drop next billing cycle, well….
I had Chrome cast and DTVN for a few days.I really didn’t like using my tablet for a remote so I canceled hoping for DTVN on Roku.Amazon Fire is unavailable around here.Maybe I’ll try it again if it is on Roku some day