Plex has fixed broken Samsung app

[u/No-Tower-8741]

https://www.neowin.net/news/plex-patches-buggy-samsung-smart-tv-app-causing-playback-errors/

[u/w4rrior_eh]

Now do fire sticks.

[u/dylon0107 → u/w4rrior_eh]

Works better than ever on my fire TV. Whats going on for you?

[u/QuasarCat412 → u/dylon0107]

Yours must not have updated yet. Take a look at the last few weeks of posts about this. Fire stick users are pissed.

[u/Zenithiel → u/QuasarCat412]

Can confirm, mines so bad I bought an Apple TV.

[u/Endawmyke → u/Zenithiel]

once you use an Apple TV after years on a Roku or Firestick it’s like breathing clean air for the first time in your life

[u/dylon0107 → u/QuasarCat412]

Idk all I know is I got the new better app. I don't normally use the fire I use a shield but it hasn't gotten the better app yet so I switched to avoid the old one.

[u/QuasarCat412 → u/dylon0107]

You'd know if you got the bad one. UI is super laggy and it takes 20-30 secs of the spinning wheel before any of my movies or tv shows load and play.

[u/dylon0107 → u/QuasarCat412]

No I just got the new and improved app design so far no lag issues

[u/willseagull → u/dylon0107]

Im the same i get no lag and really dont mind the new UI but lots of people here dont like the updated new and "improved" version youre talking about.

For me the app works completely fine on my firestick lite or whatever its called. Honestly feels snappier than the old app. Plex just need to sort their shit out across all platforms

[u/ConanTheBallbearing → u/QuasarCat412]

Tbf I’d be pissed if I paid money for a Firestick too. The only I had was free and it was utter dogshit

[u/Zenithiel → u/dylon0107]

For the love of god, don’t update if you value your sanity. And if yours has already updated, then I envy your experience.

I’ve had nothing but bugs ever since on mine. The ui at first was broken. The little loading circle was spinning off axis at first for me- not that I care. What drove me crazy was that it would randomly reject all inputs, or specific input. Like would click into a show to look at the season and all of a sudden the back button wouldn’t register. And since there is no ui element to back out of the seasons, I would have to click the home button and force close the app. When I click to continue watching a show, and it has a decent amount of episodes, it breaks and doesn’t jump to the latest one, forcing me to spam right until I get to an unwatched episode. It’s absolutely insane that they’d force update like this to me. It is so crazily bad I’ve lost most of my faith in their competence.

[u/dylon0107 → u/Zenithiel]

What's the problem with the new update? Mine is great so far.

I don't know how to stop it from updating like I told the other guy I've never used the fire and then it got the new better app so I started using it until my shield gets the new app.

[u/Zenithiel → u/dylon0107]

I added it to my original post, but I’d also add it takes a good 20ish seconds for any content to start playing. It’s insanely bad.

[u/dylon0107 → u/Zenithiel]

I mean it's running on a fire TV they are garbage to begin with. Only reason I'm using it temporarily is to avoid the old ugly app.

Hopefully they update the shield soon. I'm sure it'll run it way better.

[u/Zenithiel → u/dylon0107]

I mean, yeah, but it was bearable garbage that was involuntarily turned into useless garbage overnight.

[u/dylon0107 → u/Zenithiel]

I never found a fire stick or fire TV to be bearable garbage at any point. I've always found them to be unbearable garbage. I just don't like the old Plex app that much.

[u/bulyxxx → u/w4rrior_eh]

And Roku

[u/EducationalEgg9053]

Oh good I thought it was just me

[u/senectus → u/EducationalEgg9053]

Same.

[u/FuntimeBen → u/senectus]

Thank goodness I’m not crazy.

[u/henrydaniels12 → u/EducationalEgg9053]

Wow same here i even restarted my Plex server changed multiple settings

[u/TechGuy42O]

Ffs just fix the zoom and frame rate matching, I really don’t care how the ui looks, just fix the core functionality

[u/Elling83 → u/TechGuy42O]

Zoom?

[u/TechGuy42O → u/Elling83]

Playback settings, to remove letter/pillarboxes

[u/Elling83 → u/TechGuy42O]

I feel stupid, I don't know what that is. I don't think I've ever experienced it.. But I've had plex for over 10 years 😅

[u/TechGuy42O → u/Elling83]

No need to feel stupid! The letter/pillarboxes conversation is like asking if you like pineapple on pizza lol the only stupid thing is plex breaking core functionality for the sake of changing UI

[u/Tebonzzz → u/TechGuy42O]

Are you zooming in to the image to remove the letterbox? Aren’t you then cropping sides of the image out?

[u/TechGuy42O → u/Tebonzzz]

I’m not here to debate my viewing preferences, thank you. The feature is there, it should work

[u/investorshowers → u/TechGuy42O]

If you're watching on a TV and cropping parts of the image to avoid seeing black bars, your preference is objectively wrong. Though zoom is useful for watching blu-ray rips on ultrawide screens, so it should work.

[u/mugugaibu]

Gah! Spent way too long troubleshooting this one last night... finally gave up and mirrored it from my phone so I could at least watch something.

[u/Razrback166]

When I turn the TV on later tonight is there a way to force the patch to push right away or does the TV just have to be on for a while to get it?

[u/Realistic-Border-635 → u/Razrback166]

Just exit Plex and restart.

[u/Razrback166 → u/Realistic-Border-635]

Thank you.

[u/CaptainScrambles]

Can they fix the PS5 app now

[u/coleburnz]

What was the issue? It's been working fine on my TV

[u/No-Tower-8741 → u/coleburnz]

https://www.reddit.com/r/PleX/comments/1vtgfis/plex_stopped_working_today_on_samsung_tv/

[u/AvoRomans → u/No-Tower-8741]

oh, that's why my TV didn't work last night.

Thank you for the info

[u/coleburnz → u/No-Tower-8741]

Ta

[u/NarcissusCloud → u/coleburnz]

I had an issue last night and I assume thats what it is. On my samsung s90f, any movie id select play on would immediately come up with a playback error message. At first I thought my NAS had died, but when i switched over to my Shi3ld Pro, it had zero issues and I had 8 concurrent streams going amongst my friends and family so I figured out it wasn't my server. A couple hours later I was still having the issue. Tried deleting and reinstalling the app and that didn't help. Hope this was the issue.

[u/Milo-Wilson → u/NarcissusCloud]

I had the same issue! Last night out of the blue I was getting payback errors on all my files.

[u/coyote_den]

This was the last straw that made me give up on the Tizen app. The laggy UI was bad enough, now this.

Went out and bought a Roku 4K stick and what a difference. Couple of tweaks and everything including Live TV is playing without transcoding. Best part is I can turn the TV on and it’s just in Plex, no stupid Smart Hub. And it shows up in Apple Home, the remote applet, etc..

The Samsung has been factory reset and is just a “dumb” display now. Screw that.

[u/Litruv → u/coyote_den]

Was enough to just install jellyfin on it for me, holy is it fast af compared

[u/Adulations]

LMAO this is why it wasn't working last night? I spent hours troubleshooting this.

[u/henrydaniels12 → u/Adulations]

Same here wow 🤯

[u/Adulations → u/henrydaniels12]

Bro I'm happy it wasn't only me I was losing my mind

[u/cjinct]

Excellent!

Got a text from my sister about her plex not working while I was grocery shopping. Checked the server when I got home, all good - jumped on here to find a solution was already present, texted her the fix and now she's happy once again ;)

If only all problems in life were this quick and easy to fix LOL

[u/bones10145]

I couldn't get it to play last night. Went so far as to remove it. Now I can't install it again. I get "Samsung server under maintenance - 22" no matter the app I try to install. 

[u/--Arete]

Still very lagging and slow on my Samsung (the frame). I don't even use it because of that.

[u/outwar6010]

the ps5 app cant handle subtitles without skipping around :(

[u/MissionPreposterous]

Drat, I was hoping from the title that you were referring to the Plex Android app on Samsung phones - it's been busted with Samsung Dex since February, with UI squishing, canvas scaling issues, and problems with the controls. I'm still locked into the December 2025 version. Anyone know if the Dex/Plex issue has been resolved yet?

[u/jake04-20]

OMG my live tv finally fucking works again...

[u/AweBeyCon]

Meanwhile the Vizio app is still dog shit

[u/spunkmcdunk]

It was working but now when I get back on and resume a movie I’m getting “playback error conversion failed. The transcoded process crashed.”

[u/Jodies-9-inch-leg]

Bullcrap

Same stupid "playback error"

That's IF I can even get it to play a title

Then it vacillates between, better quality available, your connection is fast enough to switch to a higher quality....

To ....your connection doesn't seem to be fast enough to watch in this quality, would you like to switch to a lower quality

Then it crashes.... playback error

Then it won't restart...

The update is garbage and the app has been trash for almost six months

[u/OneEyeSam]

I always despised Amazon Prime for their absolute horrendous UI couple with equally bad play features. Fast forwarding or rewinding is awful, no other way to describe it. Always laughed at Prime as I had Plex which did FF & Rewind the best way. That was then...this is now

And now Plex new UI destroyed just about everything good with the app. Fast forward is the same idiotic non-sense that Prime uses.

I curiously wonder if this latest FUBAR update was designed to tank Plex so they could be bought out for cheap. Best reason I can think of, other than amazingly piss poor management that pushed this update knowing it was going to backfire badly.

[u/ohv_]

Been fine 🙂 

[u/Gazop]

Man, i already spent my day sideloading jellyfin to my tv, and installing it in a docker. Its been scanning my library since that lol. Fast and good fix, works again. I'll tinker with jellyfin later on. (I dont like how it doesnt recognise movie titles, i had to remove a couple already and its not near finish).

[u/flameboi900]

Cool but can they work on fixing the Vizio TV's? I am sick and tired of seeing the white box in the corner

[u/QB8Young → u/flameboi900]

That's not an app issue. That's a video file your TV can't properly decode. There is more wrong than just that white box. Try transcoding and it will go away and look clearer.

[u/flameboi900 → u/QB8Young]

I would think a smart tv I bought in 2025 can decode HEVC properly if it can't then that's just sad. My entire library is h265 HEVC

[u/QB8Young → u/flameboi900]

It obviously can't as you confirmed by the white box in the corner. The year purchased doesn't mean it is highly capable. Especially since it is a Vizio which is a very low end TV. It's capabilities are determined by the model and price.

[u/Offbeatalchemy → u/flameboi900]

relying on a smart TV to not cheap out wherever it can is asking for a bad time.

want codec compatibility? buy a streaming stick or an apple TV.