Picture in Picture is now available for Apple TV and iOS.

You asked for it…a lot. You expected it to already be there, and you were right. If you’ve been a Channels fan for a while, you might be familiar with the technical hurdles we had to overcome to make Picture in Picture work. We didn’t give up on you, and now it’s here.

custom channels

How Did You Finally Do It?

PIP is very tricky. It requires the native video player, but we don’t use the native video player. Luckily, thanks to the work we have been pursuing for a year to modernize our playback engine, we’ve been able to bridge our video player and the native PIP player.

This means that PIP now Just Works. It works without the need for transcoding, without any tricks, and without a DVR server requirement. When you want PIP, just select the button and you’ll enter PIP. This works with everything: HDHomeRun video, TV Everywhere channels, recordings, etc.

This has been our #1 request for years. We’re excited to finally deliver it to you.

Enable Picture In Picture

Channels for Apple TV has PIP turned off by default. You can enable it in the app’s Settings under the Playback option. Once you do, you can use the PIP button that hovers above the timeline.

Channels for iOS has PIP turned on by default. You can use the PIP button in the top right corner of the video player.

You can learn more about Picture in Picture in our support article.