All Upcoming Google TV Remotes to Feature a ‘Free TV’ Button Starting This Month

It has now been reported that all the upcoming Google TV devices hitting the market from April 2025 will be offering remotes featuring a dedicated ‘Free TV’ button. This will enable users to easily launch the Live tab and access free TV channels from Google TV FreePlay library.

Read more about it below.

Google TV Remotes to Feature a ‘Free TV’ Button?

Back in early 2023, Google had started to widely roll out a Live tab on its Google TV devices that enables interested users to access free channels with ads on them without having to install any apps or pay for any subscriptions. As of now, including channels like Court TV, Hell’s Kitchen, BBC Earth, and Hallmark Movies, over 150 live TV channels can be accessed on the Google TV FreePlay library.

Last year in 2024, the market saw the arrival of a few Google TVs with a remote featuring a large ‘Free TV’ button on it, and notably the Onn 4K Pro from Walmart is one among these devices. By tapping on it, users can open the Live tab from where they can go ahead and watch free TV channels. So far only a few Google TVs have been launched with the ‘Free TV’ button, but as per new reports, Google has instructed original equipment manufacturers (OEM) to either have a ‘Free TV’ or ‘Live TV’ on all their upcoming Google TV models’ remotes starting from this month in April 2025. The request was raised by the brand early last year itself as per the report, so the OEMs seem to have received the needed time to make the necessary changes.

Also to add, in markets outside the United States where the brand’s FreePlay service isn’t available, the ‘Free TV’ or ‘Live TV’ button is asked to be mapped with live guides as an alternative solution.