Xbox OneGuide TV will be closed in May, the era of Xbox as a TV center ends

Xbox OneGuide TV will be closed in May

The Xbox OneGuide TV app will be closed in May 2021 and represents an important event because it can be considered the official conclusion of the era of "Xbox TV", or of the original vision of Xbox One by Don Mattrick, who saw the machine in question as a sort of multimedia center destined to dominate the living room.

Many things have changed since then and the new management by Phil Spencer has substantially changed the vision of the Xbox, now more centered on video games in a substantial way but also more dematerialized in terms of hardware, moved to different platforms with a greater concentration on services.

In any case, TV seems to no longer be part of the Xbox programs: "Based on usage and feedback collected from users, we are continuing to evolve the Xbox experience ", said Jonathan Hildebrandt, program manager for Xbox Experiences at Microsoft," To this end, starting in May we will close the support for the OneGuide TV guide on Xbox One ".

To tell the truth, OneGuide TV was also a rather interesting tool: on Xbox One it allows you to have information on the television channels accessible by users and also organize them, as well as obviously watching TV through the app. This in fact assumes the use of the HDMI-In port present on Xbox One but eliminated on Xbox Series X | S, which in fact cuts the whole question out.

The elimination of the HDMI pass-through has been already a declaration of intent in this sense: Xbox Series X | S are not intended to cover that role of general decoder of TV content that was planned for Xbox One, complete with the release of the dedicated USB digital terrestrial tuner.

On the other hand, the increasingly widespread use of streaming services has probably made the use of TV on digital terrestrial marginal and in any case the presence of specific official apps for these services, such as Netflix, Amazon Prime Video and Disney +, bypass any other system. So let's get ready to finally say goodbye to OneGuide TV on Xbox One starting from May 2021.

Xbox OneGuide TV works as an interactive TV guide for TV channels on Xbox Source

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Xbox OneGuide to be switched off, ending Xbox One's TV dream

TV, TV, TV. Xbox One launched in a terrible state, with a half-finished dashboard, flaky Kinect controls and nebulous plans to make TV programs.

Part of its positioning as the 'one' device you'd need connected to your telly was its ability to act as a TV pass-through, so you could hook up your cable box or your USB TV tuner.

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Thankfully, all of that went away very quickly, along with many of the Microsoft execs who thought it was a good idea. But one element has remained until now: OneGuide, Xbox One's TV listings app.

This, finally, will also go away in May. No longer will your Xbox provide you with details on the next episode of Family Guy to be broadcast.

'Based on customer usage and feedback, we're constantly evolving the Xbox experience. To that end, beginning this May we'll be sunsetting live TV listings for OneGuide on Xbox One,' Microsoft's Jonathan Hildebrandt wrote in a new blog post.

'You can continue to use OneGuide to view your connected HDMI devices or USB TV tuner. You can also keep using OneGuide for HDMI-passthrough and to watch TV via USB TV tuners, but you won't be able to access the on-screen TV Listings guide.'

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That's not to say Microsoft has now given up on TV completely. After nearly 10 years of development - ever since that Xbox One launch, really - the long-awaited Halo TV series will finally debut next year in Q1 2022.