Want to share your Apple TV Plus subscription with family members (even if they don't live with you)? "Be our guest," Apple says. (Rick Broida/Yahoo)
Show of hands: Who had "Apple TV+ has the best original content of any streaming service" on their 2025 bingo card? Not many palms up, I see, but here we are. Apple, the company known for iPhones and MacBooks, is behind many of the buzziest TV series of the past several years: Severance, Shrinking, Ted Lasso, Bad Sisters, Slow Horses, Silo, The Morning Show and Mythic Quest, to name just a few. Granted, its track record with movies is less impressive — for every CODA, there are about half a dozen Argylles — but Apple TV+ is also surprisingly affordable. And ad-free. And OK with subscription-sharing (with a few caveats).
There's a lot of amusing irony packed into all that — an affordable Apple product? — but not all of it is positive: Apple TV+ has a terrible interface. Like, shockingly bad. For a company that's all about creating delightful user experiences, this one falls on its face. But should that influence your decision to subscribe? Here's my Apple TV+ review. (And before I dive in, note that there's a rare sale happening right now: 3 months of Apple TV+ for just $9.)
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VERDICT: Apple TV+ has the best original-content batting average of any streaming service right now, and it's ad-free to boot. Unfortunately, it also has the most irritating interface.
An Apple TV Plus subscription costs $9.99 per month, end of story. There are no tiers, no added costs for ad-free viewing, no surcharge if you want to share your subscription with others. In fact, Apple specifically calls out the fact that up to five additional people (six total) can use the same account, a refreshing change from the Draconian likes of Netflix (no sharing unless you pay extra) and Max (no sharing outside the household, period).
Of course, actually figuring out how to do that is another story, as explained later in the review.
The only real caveat here is what your $10/month is actually buying you. Streamers like Netflix and Hulu provide a ton of third-party content and a smattering of originals. Apple TV+ is just the opposite: Mostly original content, a sliver of non-Apple stuff. As a result, the overall library is much smaller: According to streaming guide JustWatch, the service is home to around 280 movies and TV shows. Most competitors' libraries number in the thousands.
Also, while your viewing won't be interrupted by commercials (save for some live sports, like baseball), you'll often see an ad for other Apple TV+ content when you start watching a movie or show. Thankfully, you can skip right past it with one click of your remote.
Look, I know plenty of people who subscribed to Apple TV+ just to watch Severance. Or Ted Lasso. I wasn't kidding when I said that this is currently the top spot for original content. I was flabbergasted by the movie-quality production value of Silo, and I thought the first season of Bad Sisters was among the best dark comedies I've ever seen.
And the hits keep on coming: I'm just a few episodes into The Studio and absolutely loving it, and eagerly anticipating the upcoming Murderbot, based on the bestselling Murderbot Diaries book series by Martha Wells. Racing fans can look forward to Brad Pitt in F1 (in theaters first, on Apple TV+ eventually); Jon Hamm fans should enjoy the upcoming drama series Your Friends & Neighbors.
For kids and families, Apple TV+ offers a modest selection of shows and movies, including a new Fraggle Rock series, Yo Gabba Gabba and a good helping of Peanuts (new and classic alike). If you're feeling nostalgic for the likes of It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, you'll find it here.
Apple also offers an add-on: The Major League Soccer (MLS) Season Pass, which costs $14.99 monthly ($12.99 if you're already an Apple TV+ subscriber) or $99 per season (or $79 with Apple TV+). While MLS Season Pass is also available separately from Apple TV+, it's worth noting that anyone holding season tickets to an MLS team gets the Season Pass package at no extra charge. (Some T-Mobile subscribers can get it free as well.)
For all its TV hits, Apple has produced some pretty underwhelming movies: Ghosted, Napoleon and the aforementioned Argylle all received dismal Rotten Tomatoes scores, and even Tom Hanks couldn't move the needle much with vehicles like Finch and Greyhound. The more recent Wolfs, starring no less than George Clooney and Brad Pitt, was met with a collective "meh" by critics (but, so help me, I liked it).
Of course, 2021's CODA and 2023's Killers of the Flower Moon earned widespread praise, plus a mess of Oscars and Oscar nominations (respectively). And as with all streaming services, whether you like Apple TV+ content depends in large part on what your tastes are. To my thinking, much of what's here qualifies as "prestige TV," with a spared-no-expense level of production quality. Everything on this channel looks good.
Actually using the service, though? That's where I get frustrated.
Now, strap in because this gets confusing — and it's all Apple's fault. The weird, confusing branding of "Apple TV" actually refers to three distinct entities. The first is the Apple TV 4K box, a media streamer that starts at $129 and competes with generally more affordable devices from the likes of Roku, Amazon and Google. (See my list of the best streaming devices to learn more.)
The second is the Apple TV app, which is available on all of those devices and most new smart TVs. Within that app — and here's where things really get convoluted, like on an Inception level — you can access at least three separate buckets of content. The first is the video store, aka the current iteration of what used to affectionately be known as iTunes. This is where you rent and buy movies and TV shows a-la-carte.
You can also subscribe to subscription channels and link to third-party streaming services — though your flexibility in that regard varies depending upon the service and the device on which you're running the Apple TV app. For instance, you can subscribe to AMC+, Hallmark+ and MGM+ in the Apple TV app (but only some versions), and the resulting shows and movies will appear alongside Apple TV+ originals. But larger services like Peacock, Max and Paramount+ can only be linked to their respective apps, and only on Apple devices. So a show like Star Trek: Strange New Worlds will appear in search, but clicking on it will jump you over to the Paramount+ app. (Did I mention this is all confusing as hell?) But you won't see any Netflix shows, because that streamer hasn't yet cut a deal with Apple, and seems to be in no rush to do so.
The third incarnation of the Apple TV moniker is Apple TV+, the subscription service that we've been talking about here. So, Apple TV+ content lives on the Apple TV app, which you may or may not be accessing on an Apple TV box. Got it? (No, didn't think so.)
So, with the Apple TV terminology (somewhat) demystified, let's move on to using the aforementioned app. Put simply, I think Apple TV has the worst user interface (UI) of any modern streaming service, and that's saying something. It's poorly organized, illogically designed and downright user-hostile in places. I'm very close to saying "Don't subscribe!" just out of spite.
I tested both the Google TV and Roku versions of the Apple TV app; the former is the worse of the two, primarily because it doesn't allow for purchases, rentals, subscription trials or the like.
For example, the Home screen features a familiar top-half carousel that flips through new and noteworthy releases. Browse through it and you might see, say, Surface, an Apple show — and Happy Face, a Paramount+ show. Both have a big white button labeled "Go to Show." But if you're using the Google TV app, you can't actually watch Happy Face — all you can do is add it to your Watchlist. If you do that, and then go to your Watchlist, yep, it's there. How to actually, you know, watch it? No help offered.
Also in the carousel: the movie Last Breath. Click through to that and you'll see a "How to Watch" button. Answer: You have to "rent or purchase it on an Apple device." Thankfully, the Roku app actually does afford those options. And with the aforementioned Happy Face, you're at least given the option of signing up for a Paramount+ free trial.
This isn't limited to the carousel; the Home screen is full of stuff that's not included as part of your subscription, but also not immediately identifiable as such. For example, there's an entire row devoted to those aforementioned "Channels," all of which require additional subscriptions (Acorn, BritBox, MGM+, etc.). View any show within one of these channels, click "Go to Show," then wind up with nothing but an "Add to Watchlist" button (if you're in the Google app; Roku users can get free trials for most of them).
As for the overall UI, it consists of a side menu and large, visually pleasing tiles — though some would say too large, because at most you can see two rows' worth of them at a time, and only four to five tiles in each row (depending on where you are in the UI). Thus there's a lot of scrolling required, both vertically and horizontally.
As you browse around, it's hard to tell what item is selected — where your cursor is, so to speak — because all it does is enlarge slightly; there's no added border or coloring or anything else to help you spot it more easily. Countless times I've struggled to determine which tile is actually highlighted; you glance away for one second and it gets "lost" when your gaze returns.
Apple's Search feature works well enough, dynamically displaying results as you enter them — though there's no support for voice search in the Google TV or Roku apps. (This capability is available only with an Apple TV streaming device.) The Library section is fairly straightforward as well: It's where you access movies or TV shows you've rented or purchased, including any that are part of your Movies Anywhere account (if you have one).
Below Search and Home, the next side-menu option is Apple TV+. Again, that's the entry point for originals like Ted Lasso and Severance — but it feels confusing to see a standalone menu option with the same name as the service you're using. Meanwhile, I mentioned the Watchlist, used to bookmark stuff you want to view, but where is it? Not in the aforementioned side menu. You have to scroll down — in the Home screen, mind you; it's not available in the Apple TV+ page — until you find it, then scroll horizontally until you find the movie or show you want. That's literally the only way to find and browse your watchlist.
Now, suppose you're about to start Severance, season two, but decide you want to rewatch the first season. You see the show in your Continue Watching row, but when you click it, it immediately starts playing the next episode (i.e., episode one of season two). How do you actually get to the show page so you can select the episode you want? There's no obvious way; you'd have to navigate to it somewhere else in the UI — often easier said than done. (Pro tip: When you land on an episode, you can click and hold the remote's OK/select button for a few seconds; a pop-up menu then gives you the option of going to the main show page. But how would anyone know that?)
When you do get to the show page for a particular series, it doesn't show you any additional episodes; the only indication they might be available are tiny slivers of tiles peeking up from the bottom. Aha, OK, so you scroll down a click and, yep, there they are. But how do you get to previous seasons? You have to scroll up a click to the Seasons list that the UI just skipped you past. So, to recap: Scroll down, then back up again, then back down. Oh, and below each thumbnail for each episode is a summary tile for that episode, which you can also scroll to. It's all just unnecessarily complicated.
Want to browse Apple's content library by category? Maybe just see all the documentaries or comedies? There's no way to do this from the side menu; you have to scroll way, way down the Home screen to find the Browse by Genre row. (Oh, but while Comedy is there, Documentary isn't.) Switch over to the Apple TV+ page and you'll find a Browse by Category row; it has "Nonfiction Films & Series" and other categories, but when you click through, they're all listed in random order. No sub-categories, either.
Let me be clear: I've been an Apple TV+ subscriber for years. Although the interface has improved in dribs and drabs along the way, I still struggle to navigate it. Likewise, even though the Apple TV+ experience is more feature-rich on Apple devices (voice search, faster navigation, more robust app-linking), the same basic interface shortfalls remain. (Here's a hack of sorts: If you subscribe to Apple TV+ via Amazon, you can get all the same content in a more streamlined interface — namely, Amazon Prime Video's. It's not perfect, but an improvement.)
Next up: account sharing. In other services' apps (Netflix, Hulu, etc.), you add user profiles with just a few clicks. In the Apple TV app, when you navigate to the Switch User menu and choose Add User, you're immediately signed out. This happened repeatedly in both the Google and Roku versions. And it's not just a verification thing; every time I signed back in, I landed back at the Home page. There was never an option to complete the add-user process.
Part of the issue is that Apple TV+ is intrinsically tied to your Apple Account (previously known as "Apple ID"). Step back and look at the full Apple services universe and you'll see that Apple TV+ sits alongside Apple Arcade, Apple News+, Apple Music, Apple Fitness+ and iCloud+, all of which can be purchased separately or bundled together in a service called Apple One, which is available in various configurations ranging from $20 per month (four services for an individual) to $38 per month (all six services for a family group of six people).
The most direct way to share an Apple TV+ subscription is by bringing someone into your Apple Account Family Sharing group, a setting accessible via your iCloud account on your iPhone, iPad or other Apple device. Up to six people can be in Family group, but be sure to read the fine print: You're not just sharing the video service, but also opening up your purchased video library, Apple apps, iCloud storage and much more. And if someone is already in another Apple Family Sharing group, they can't simultaneously be in yours. In other words, proceed with caution: This isn't like sharing a Netflix password.
And speaking of family, Apple allows only "global" content restrictions, meaning any ratings-related limits you set up for movies and TV shows will apply to all users, not just those of certain ages. If there's a way to impose restrictions just for kids, I couldn't find it — despite a lot of poring through Apple's online help pages.
I suppose indicting Apple TV+ for its bad interface is kind of like indicting air travel because there was a screaming baby on your flight. Annoying, absolutely, but you lived through it and ultimately made it to Paris.
So although no other streaming service makes me pull my hair the way Apple TV+ does, I will likely remain a subscriber — at least sporadically, when there are new shows and/or seasons I want to watch.
Indeed, even if you just sign up for a month or two here or there, it's a pretty good bet you'll find plenty of bingeable content. When I think about some of my favorite shows of the last few years, an awful lot of them originated on Apple TV+.
Check out Yahoo's latest streaming advice, based on hands-on testing.
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