Apple TV keeps losing ground in the streaming wars for the dumbest reason

Let me be clear — I love my Apple TV 4K, and I tried to replace my ancient first-gen model with something newer, but I’ve been unable to do it just yet. It does everything I ask of it, and it’s still one of, if not the fastest, streamers on the market despite its age. However, it’s not a product I can recommend to everybody, and the simple reason for that is its price.

A third-gen Apple TV 4K costs $130 or $150 depending on the model, but both of those prices come in far higher than any other streamer on the market. The Google Streamer and Roku Ultra cost $100, and those are the next two closest in price. For a while, the rumored Sonos streamer was expected to blow past all of those prices, but the product was canceled before it ever saw the light of day. A lot of people make decisions based on price, and considering that the Apple TV 4K hardly ever goes on sale, it’s a tough recommendation to friends and family. For people looking for the best of the best, it makes sense, but the casual viewer doesn’t typically care about things like picture quality or having the best audio.

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People often say the Apple TV 4K has the best picture quality of all the streaming devices, and that could very well be true. I’m very happy with mine, and there’s nothing it can’t do picture quality-wise that I wish it could. The reality is that not everybody has the same expectations. This is evidenced by the sheer number of people who continue to mount their TVs over a fireplace. Nobody who does that doesn’t do it with picture quality or the overall viewing experience in mind.

I have an Apple TV 4K, Fire TV Stick 4K Max, and a Roku Ultra, and all of them fill specific niches for me. The Roku Ultra is my bedroom device, the Fire Stick is in the basement, and my Apple TV sits in my living room as my main device. If I didn’t already have the Apple TV first, any one of these streamers could be in the living room, and I doubt I’d notice much of a difference. I picked up my Apple TV a few years ago on eBay, so that was how I managed to find one cheaper than a Roku Ultra or Google Streamer. Not everybody wants a used product, and I don’t blame them for that. If you want something new, the Apple TV 4K is a tough sell for anybody looking to stay on a budget.

Most people are looking for a cheap and effective way to keep up with their favorite TV shows and movies when they pick up a streaming device, and that’s just not an area Apple is competitive in. If the Apple TV 4K dropped its price down to somewhere between $80 and $100, I don’t even think there would be a conversation as to what the best streamer is. I don’t even know if the Roku Ultra would even exist to be completely honest. The Apple TV 4K is my favorite streamer, but it’s hard to say it’s actually the best when it’s priced the way it is. Coupled with the fact that the average person may not even notice a quality difference, a $25 streaming stick could be the better buy for a lot of people. No, it won’t perform better than the high-end Apple TV 4K, but it’s close enough.

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The value doesn’t always justify the price

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Although the Apple TV 4K is viewed as the top dog, there are quite a few things holding it back in my eyes. Outside of the price, I’m not a fan of how some features are locked away behind different tiers. The $150 Apple TV 4K is the only way you can get a model with an Ethernet port. This next one is more on me than anything, but the Apple TV is the only Apple product I own, and it’s punishing in a few ways.

One of the coolest features of the Apple TV is using an iPhone to find your lost remote. The remote is quite small, and whether your child took it to another room or you lost it in the couch cushion, it’s never hard to find if you have your iPhone nearby. While that’s nice and all, the Roku Ultra has this functionality built right into the device via a dedicated button, so Android owners don’t lose any features. This and the Ethernet port are two things that come in handy for anybody, so seeing both of those features not readily available to everybody is a bit weird, especially since Apple already charges a premium for its device.

Roku and Amazon are both doing a good job appealing to the masses, while Apple has more bells and whistles. Things like Apple Arcade, Apple Music with Dolby Atmos, and an ad-free interface are all nice to have, but only if those are things you care about. If you’re one of those aforementioned people who have a streaming device mainly to watch shows, none of this matters a whole lot.

I actually picked up the Fire Stick for my basement thanks to the cheap price of about $40. I don’t need it to do much more than run Netflix, so any of the benefits that it does have come as a bonus. A big one is the Xbox Game Pass support through the Cloud, although it’s not something I haven’t tried out just yet. Price was what held me back from getting a second and third Apple TV. While it’s a great fit for my main viewing area, I can’t justify that price to use it as a secondary device. On the other hand, I could very easily see somebody pick up multiple Roku or Amazon sticks just to have a connected ecosystem. This is part of why I’d love to see Apple introduce an affordable streaming stick, but that seems like wishful thinking more than anything at this point.

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