AT&T TV: Unremarkable Android TV Hardware, Aggressive Broadband Pricing, Contracts, and Steep Price Jumps
AT&T was once a telecom company with some cable and broadband operations, but after buying DirecTV and Time Warner, it became a media/telco behemoth with far too many confusing TV services. AT&T’s live TV services – like most live TV services, whether traditional or OTT – are now losing subscribers as cord-cutting rises and new on-demand streaming services like Disney+ and AppleTV+ hit the market. The streaming services are proliferating quickly thanks to apps for mobile viewing, smart TV platforms from Samsung, Amazon, Roku, and Google, and inexpensive media players from Roku and Amazon. AT&T will be adding to the streaming options with HBO Max later in the year. But first, AT&T is launching yet another live TV service, AT&T TV.
AT&T is taking an interesting hybrid approach with AT&T TV, combining service-specific hardware, a cable-like user experience that mostly hides Google’s underlying Android TV OS, OTT service delivery, cloud DVR, and two-year contracts. The set top box itself is a small and thin bland box with WiFi, Ethernet, and HDMI outputs. The remote control is wonderful: more substantial than remotes that ship with most streaming media boxes, shaped nicely to fit in the hand, and filled with a full array of buttons for navigation, voice control, and numeric channel selection. One box comes free with each subscription, up to two additional boxes can be purchased ($120 each, spread out over 12 monthly payments), and an app is available for iOS and Android viewing. Up to three simultaneous streams are allowed.
The most compelling aspect of AT&T TV is not the TV service or the hardware, but the potential to bundle it with aggressively priced gigabit fiber broadbrand service AT&T offers in 21 states. There are also discounts when combined with AT&T wireless plans. The TV pricing itself looks reasonable compared to unbundled cable or satellite TV, but many MSOs are bundling TV with broadband at cut-rate prices to curb cord-cutting. AT&T TV does not compare well to OTT services like YouTube TV or Sling TV that run on smart TVs or inexpensive Roku and Amazon sticks. AT&T TV does provide a simpler way to get most of your local TV stations than OTT services that may require an antenna, but AT&T TV has its own programming holes, and the pricing and terms are far worse. There is a $20 activation fee, and the $49/month promotional pricing nearly doubles after 12 months, while consumers are locked into a 24-month contract.
What to Watch
Most of the major cable channels are included with the base Entertainment package or the expanded Choice package. The main local networks are included, but secondary channels in large metropolitan areas and cable access channels are missing. Regional sports networks are available but only at additional cost. If you want NFL Sunday Ticket, you’ll still need a DirecTV Dish and separate subscription, even though AT&T owns both services. NFL RedZone is also conspicuously absent.
You can download many streaming media apps from the Google Play Store in the App section of the Home page, and then access them without changing remotes or TV inputs. Netflix is actually integrated into the programming guide, and HBO Max will also be woven into the user interface as well once it launches. The box can also be used as a Chromecast for viewing content from your computer or phone. However, the biggest programming holes are app-related: Amazon Prime Video, Disney’s Hulu, and Apple TV+ are not available.
User Experience
I have been testing AT&T TV for just over a week on my own Verizon Fios gigabit service; AT&T broadband is not available where I live. AT&T will be offering the TV service nationally, and if you are not using AT&T’s broadband, the company recommends a minimum of 25 Mbps service for good performance. Most channels are available in HD; the AT&T TV box allows Android apps like Netflix and Disney+ to output 4K HDR10, but not Dolby Vision.
For TV service, consumers are expected to set up the box themselves – no truck roll is required, or available (though one is required for AT&T’s fiber broadband service). Aside from some initial sluggishness, setting up the system was straightforward, and most consumers should be able to handle this without a problem.
AT&T has almost completely replaced Android TV’s native user interface, replacing it with something that is extremely TV-centric. As soon as the setup process is complete, you are dumped into a full screen live TV channel with no graphics or menus. When you return to the system after having turned it off, you are back on the last channel you watched. There is a grid-based Guide that gets overlaid on top of whatever you are watching, and you can press the Channel Up/Down toggle on the remote to channel surf just like a cable box. There is a home page with ribbons of apps and promoted content, but you need to specifically invoke it to get there. Compared to most streaming media boxes, this user interface feels warmly familiar or anachronistically retro, depending on your age and point of view. (I’m old. I liked it.)
Some aspects of the UI are well designed. For example, the Movies section (found under “Discover” in the Home menu) provides a nicely consolidated way to see what’s available on-demand on various channels, which is especially welcome if you subscribe to premium channels like HBO and Showtime. Asking for “The Simpsons,” not only brought up the show and the ability to record it, but broke down which seasons and episodes were available, seemingly across channels (it was not clear where the content was being aired). However, search does not extend to apps, so the complete Simpsons library on Disney+ was overlooked even after I installed the app. There are other areas where AT&T TV’s capabilities are simply not as polished as more mature platforms. For example, if you go to record a sports event, TiVo automatically suggests that you add time to the recording; AT&T TV does not offer the option, which means that if the game goes long, you’ll miss the ending.
There are persistent delays in some aspects of the user interface. Flipping through channels requires a short wait as each channel buffers before playing. Voice control is maddeningly slow, both for voice recognition itself and then for the system to produce a result. This is not the case on my Nvidia Shield Android TV box using the same network connection, so this is clearly an AT&T TV issue. I also encountered multiple cases where the voice control just didn’t work, erroneously returning no results. Other reviewers, such as USA Today’s Ed Baig, noted similar problems.
The combination of content limitations and a buggy interface led to some frustration. Our local cable system has channel 11 as The CW; there is no equivalent in AT&T TV, but I thought that surely The CW would be included. Browsing through the channel list I didn’t see it, so I tried asking for “CW,” and got no results. Asking for “The CW,” also did not work. Next I tried asking for “Supergirl,” a CW show – and that did work, so clearly the CW – or some of its content – is on the system somewhere.
Bizarrely, AT&T’s advertising focuses on AT&T TV’s voice control capabilities, despite the fact that voice control is not at all unique to AT&T TV, and even if it was, it currently does not work well enough to be a primary method of system navigation. (The ad, at least, is clever.) It almost seems like AT&T does not want to highlight the elements of AT&T TV that work better than traditional cable and satellite TV because that would encourage cord cutting.
Next Steps
AT&T needs to simplify its content offerings to convert or keep cord-cutters, but AT&T TV can’t replace AT&T’s other TV offerings until the company fixes the pricing structure, adds missing content, and improves speed and usability. There is no reason for an activation fee on a user-installed system. Contracts are not competitive in an on-demand streaming world, and if you are going to require a contract to cover hardware costs, you can’t have one-year promotional pricing on a two-year contract (with early termination fees). The hardware pricing is competitive with cable boxes and TiVo, but is triple what Roku and Amazon charge for similar hardware. Even if you do sign up for AT&T TV, you may still want another device for Amazon Prime, Hulu, Apple TV, or out-of-market NFL games.
To discuss the implications of this report on your business, product, or investment strategies, contact Avi at avi@techsponential.com or +1 (201) 677-8284.
