So how do you choose between Roku and Fire TV? To start, realize they have more similarities than differences.
Meanwhile, Amazon's newest entry, the Fire TV Stick 4K Max, is one of the fastest streaming devices on the market. The recently released Roku Streaming Stick 4K offers Dolby Vision and is sometimes on sale for less than the older and Vision-less Roku Express 4K Plus.
Most of the Roku and Fire TV devices we've reviewed received an 8.0 (excellent) rating or higher, so it's tough to go wrong. Read more: Roku and Amazon Fire TV Black Friday 2021 deals: 4K streamers start at $25Īt CNET we've spent countless hours testing both over the years, and in general, both work really well. Both boast over 50 million users and offer numerous devices with similar prices and features. In the other corner sits Amazon Fire TV, the streamer made by one of the most powerful companies in the world.
In one corner is Roku, the most popular name in streaming devices. Lots of people want a cheap, easy way to get streaming video from Netflix, Amazon Prime, Disney Plus, HBO Max, Hulu, YouTube and Apple TV Plus on their TV, and two companies make the most popular gadgets for doing just that. The big picture: The long-term nature of the deal allows Roku to avoid having another messy spat with Google for a while, giving consumers more certainty at a time when these types of fights between streamers, programmers and app developers are becoming more frequent.Roku and Amazon Fire TV are locked in a massive brawl for your living room.
Why it matters: Roku's deal with Google to distribute YouTube was set to expire this month. Roku and Google have agreed to a multi-year extension for both YouTube and YouTube TV apps to be distributed on Roku.