The official Fire TV Remote app by Amazon is a handy way to control your Fire TV and Fire TV Stick. Whether you want to use the app’s voice function because you have a non-voice physical remote, or you want to use the app’s keyboard to input text quicker than the Fire TV’s onscreen keyboard permits, the Fire TV Remote app is great to have installed on all of your phones and tablets. The app has just received its most significant update since launch with a few handy new features. You can now launch your favorited Fire TV apps directly within the remote app, put the Fire TV to sleep, and sign into your Amazon account for easier discovery of your Fire TV devices.

In the upper right corner of the Fire TV Remote app, is a new icon to access your favorite apps. Tapping it brings up a list of all the apps you have favorited on your Fire TV. The list includes both official apps from the appstore and 3rd-party apps sideloaded onto the device. At the top of the list of your favorite apps are also icons to directly jump to the Music, Photos, and Settings sections of your Fire. There is also an icon to directly put your Fire TV to sleep, which is a nice touch.

If you don’t have any apps favorited on your Fire TV, that’s not a problem because you can do it directly from within the remote app. Pressing the plus button in the upper right corner of the favorites screen brings up a list of all the apps installed on your Fire TV. Select the apps you want to favorite and they will be favorited on your Fire TV and become accessible to launch from within the app.

The other new feature in the app is the ability to sign into your Amazon account in order to better find and connect to your Fire TV. I’m not exactly sure what kind of magic this feature is doing behind the scenes, but it absolutely works to improve Fire TV discovery. I have a subnetwork connected to my main network in my house, and I have Fire TVs connected to each network. I always had to switch my phone between networks in order for the Fire TV Remote app to find the different Fire TV devices. As you can see from the screenshots above, the Fire TV Remote app was able to find the Fire TV on the subnetwork after signing into my Amazon account, without me having to switch my phone to the subnetwork.

This new version of the Fire TV Remote app carries version number 1.0.11. As of right now, it appears that the Google Play version of the app is the only one that has been updated so far, but I’m sure the iTunes version and Amazon Appstore version will receive the update soon as well. Huge thanks to Keith for letting me know about this update. I can’t always keep track of changes like this on my own, so I really appreciate those of you who contact me about newsworthy changes.

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