You’ll finally be able to turn your Google Photos snapshots into Roku screensavers with the arrival of the latest Roku OS update, which also brings on-screen “expert” picture settings, package notifications for Roku’s video doorbell, and the ability to follow your favorite sports teams.
Set to arrive in the “coming weeks,” Roku OS 12.5 comes with the usual bevy of interface tweaks. For example, a new “Highlights” row in the Sports experience will tee up video clips from recent sporting events, while channels in the live TV guide will be “personalized” and stripped of channel numbers.
Besides sports highlights, Roku OS 12.5 will let you pick a favorite team, which will add live and upcoming games for that team on the Sports screen.
Roku OS 12.5 will let you pick a favorite sports team, which adds games for that team to a dedicated row in the Sports screen.
Roku
Roku is also promising revamped music playlists, complete with new shuffle and skip ahead controls as well as a shortcut for adding a music playlist to your Save List, while What to Watch is getting categories such as TV Shows, Movies, New & Popular, and Free.
Even better, Roku players are–finally–getting support for Google Photos, allowing you to sync snapshots from your Google Photos library with the Roku Photo Stream feature.
This news story is part of TechHive’s in-depth coverage of the best media streamers.
Once you have Roku Photo Stream connected to Google Photos, you’ll be able to select albums from your online Google Photos library and turn them into Roku screensavers. Previously, Roku Photo Stream only worked with images on your phone.
Moving along, you’ll be able to tweak the picture setting for your Roku device directly on your TV, rather than just in the Roku mobile app.
The upcoming Roku OS update lets you adjust “expert” pictures settings directly on the screen rather than just in the Roku mobile app.
Roku
Available settings will include color temperature, color space, gamma correction, and noise reduction. On-screen expert picture settings will be supported on 4K Roku devices only, Roku says.
Lastly, Roku OS 12.5 will be adding a couple of handy features for owners of Roku video doorbells.
First, the update will allow for instant on-screen notifications when your Roku doorbell detects a package on your doorstep. Second, the Roku Cameras app now supports video events for doorbells, adding to the existing support for security camera video events.
Roku didn’t detail which of its players and TVs would support the update.
Roku has a list of “legacy” players that no longer receive OS updates, and that list includes the Roku 4 (Roku’s first 4K-capable player) as of March 2023.
Author: Ben Patterson, Senior Writer
Ben has been writing about technology and consumer electronics for more than 20 years. A PCWorld contributor since 2014, Ben joined TechHive in 2019, where he covers smart speakers, soundbars, and other smart and home-theater devices. You can follow Ben on Twitter.