Roku made its name as one of the first companies to offer streaming media players, and it still makes some of the best available, but for the past two years, it has also been partnering with TV manufacturers to offer Roku-branded TVs. Teaming up with companies like Hisense, Insignia, Sharp, and TCL seems to have been a good idea for Roku, as the company announced January 3 that one out of every eight smart TVs sold in the U.S. runs on the Roku platform.
These branded TVs pair the manufacturers’ own display technology and features with built-in Roku functionality, offering buyers more than 450,000 movies and TV shows across 4,500 streaming channels. This has proved to be a popular model, with more than 100 different models of Roku TVs available across the North American market.
“Roku offers TV partners an incredibly easy, efficient, and cost-effective way to build smart TVs that consumers love,” Chas Smith, general manager for
Despite the growth that Roku TVs have seen over the past two years, neither
TCL, one of the first companies to offer Roku TV models, has also benefited from the partnership. In 2015, TCL was the ninth-largest seller of smart TVs in the U.S., but in 2016 it rose to become the sixth largest, which makes it the fastest-growing TV brand in the United States.
“We’ve seen tremendous success with the Roku TV program, and we’re very eager to continue its momentum into 2017,” Chris Larson, vice president of sales and marketing for North America at TCL, said. “Our TCL
We don’t have long to wait to see what Roku plans to offer in 2017, as new 4K HDR
Editors' Recommendations
- Roku Pro Series TVs finally go after the high(er) end, start at $899
- Panasonic’s latest OLED TVs are the first with Amazon Fire TV built-in
- Sharp is bringing one of the first OLED Roku TVs to the U.S. in 2023
- Did Roku just upend the midrange TV landscape?
- Roku will start making its own Roku TVs and OLED reference design