VPN for a TV: the methods that work on Android TV, Samsung and LG

Why a VPN on a smart TV is not installed the way it is on a phone

A television is a closed operating system with a small app store, and the manufacturer decides what ends up in it. On a smartphone the client you need installs in a minute; on a TV the set of apps is limited, and installing from outside is either hidden in the developer menu or not available at all. The second difficulty is input. The connection key is a long string, and typing it from a remote with the on-screen keyboard is inconvenient to the point of giving up on the idea. The third particularity is the nature of the traffic: a TV almost always watches video, and video is more sensitive to a stable channel than messaging or mail. That is why the approach to a VPN for a TV differs from the usual one: first we work out which system the device runs, and only then decide where the client will run — in the TV itself, in a box or on the router.

VPN on Android TV and Google TV: the client right in the TV

This is the simplest case. Android TV and Google TV are ordinary Android with a different shell, so a VPN on Android TV is set up almost as it is on a smartphone: you install the client, add the connection key, press the connect button. That is how televisions from Sony and Philips are built, along with many models from Xiaomi, TCL and Hisense — though the last two makers ship part of their ranges on other systems, so the system is worth checking in the specifications of the particular model — and most TV boxes of recent years. The client will ask the system for permission to create a VPN connection, and once you confirm it, all of the TV's traffic goes through the tunnel, including the app store and system services. If the app you need is not in the catalogue for your model, it is installed from an APK file: copy the file onto a USB stick, open it with a file manager and allow installation from unknown sources. Bear in mind that most Android TV builds ship without a file manager of their own — one is installed separately from the store, Downloader for instance. We work over the VLESS and ShadowSocks protocols, so what goes on the TV is a client on the XRay core, Happ for example; Outline has no Android TV build.

VPN for a Samsung or LG TV: there is no app, but there are two paths that work

Let us put it plainly: on a Samsung with Tizen and on an LG with webOS a VPN client cannot be installed, and that is a limitation of the platforms themselves, not of our service. The Tizen and webOS stores do not admit apps of this class, and developer mode is meant for debugging: on LG with webOS it switches itself off after roughly fifty hours, and on Samsung it is arranged differently but is no permanent solution either. Services promising a ready-made app for these televisions are most often selling DNS substitution — which stops working at the first change on the video service's side. There are two paths that work. The first: bring the connection up on the router, and then the TV gets a ready-made route and nothing has to be set up on it. The second: plug an Android box into the HDMI port and watch through it. Both options give the TV full access; the difference is only in price and in the number of settings.

VPN for a TV box: a media player is cheaper than reflashing

A box is the fastest way to give a television what its own system does not. An inexpensive Android media player connects over HDMI, and from then on you are dealing with ordinary Android: app store, client installation, connection key, connect button. An old television turns into a smart TV in the process, and a new Samsung or LG gets what its platform does not give it. When choosing a box, look at the amount of RAM and support for the video codecs you need: on the cheapest models the client and the player together work heavily, and the complaints afterwards land on the VPN even though the hardware is at fault. A box takes up one device in your limit, and the limit itself depends on the plan — up to 30 devices on the top one — so a phone, a laptop and a box usually coexist comfortably. If there are several televisions in the home, setting the router up once is cheaper than buying a box for every screen.

YouTube and streaming on the big screen

Video loads the channel more evenly and for longer than any other task, so what matters is not peak speed but the absence of dips: on stutters the player lowers the quality by itself, and instead of 4K you watch mush. The VLESS protocol adds minimal overhead compared with protocols that carry a recognizable signature, such as OpenVPN. If a route stops working, access is restored without any action from you — cycling through servers and reconfiguring the client is usually unnecessary. A couple of practical tips. If the TV stands far from the router, connect it with a cable: 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi in an apartment building loses more in the evening than the tunnel itself. And switch the connection on before starting the streaming app — some services determine the region once at launch and do not recheck it until the app is closed completely.

Which server to choose for a TV

For video choose the nearest available server on the list, not the most exotic one. Every thousand kilometres adds latency, and latency on a long route turns into pauses when quality switches. A distant server is worth choosing in one case only — when the catalogue or the service itself is available from there specifically, because streaming libraries differ from country to country. Bear the reverse effect in mind as well: the service will show its interface and recommendations in the language of the country you chose, and part of the content available in another region may be missing there. If quality keeps floating, work through two or three servers in a row and keep the one on which the picture starts fastest.

If it does not work out: the remote, the key and the app store

Three problems come up most often, and all of them can be solved. The app is not found in the TV's store — the manufacturer has limited the catalogue for a particular model or region, so install the APK from a USB stick or use a box; most Android TV builds have no file manager, so install one separately, Downloader for instance. The key cannot be typed with the remote — do not type it by hand at all: the client shows a QR code on screen and you scan it with your phone, or you pass the string through a remote-control app or as a file. The client installed but the connection does not come up — check the date and time on the TV: after a power cut they often drift, and a discrepancy of more than half a minute breaks the setup of a ShadowSocks connection. If nothing helped, write to the support bot — or to support@rgvpn.pro when the messenger is unavailable — and we will suggest settings for your particular model. And keep the fallback in mind: when the television digs in for good, the router settles the question at once for every device in the apartment.

• The app is not in the store — install it from an APK file or use a box
• The key cannot be typed with the remote — a QR code on screen is scanned with your phone, and a remote app or a file also work
• The connection does not come up — check the date and time on the TV
• Video stutters — connect the TV with a cable and change the server