Seeking to flip an older TV into a sensible system with out including to your cluttered pile of wires? An improve to Amazon’s well-liked, low-cost media streaming stick slims it down, improves loading occasions, and attracts energy instantly out of your TV.
At lower than an inch thick, the brand new Fireplace TV Stick HD, out right this moment, is Amazon’s slimmest stick ever. The brand new dimensions ought to make it simpler to suit behind any TV, even ones mounted near the wall, like in a lodge room.
You additionally received’t want a wall adapter anymore: as a substitute, Amazon supplies direct energy by way of the USB port. Meaning fewer cables working round your TV and yet another spare wall outlet on your different devices.
Amazon says to anticipate “noticeable velocity enhancements”—30% quicker in contrast with its last-gen product, which means apps and content material ought to boot up faster.
That’s a wanted enchancment as PCMag’s evaluate of the previous-generation Fireplace TV Stick HD discovered it had “choppiness and sluggishness.” Our testing discovered that “switching tabs can sometimes trigger hiccups with the menus, and libraries take a number of seconds to populate.”
Our evaluate of the 2026 Fireplace TV Stick HD, nevertheless, finds that “the {hardware} enhancements and snappier efficiency make this one of many best and most reasonably priced methods to breathe new life into an older TV, and earn [it] our Editors’ Alternative award for 1080p media streamers.”
There’s additionally Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.3 connectivity right here, up from Bluetooth 5 on the last-gen. Because the identify suggests, anticipate the persist with assist Full HD decision (or 720p in some circumstances) at as much as 60 frames per second.
The latest Amazon consumer interface, which first debuted in February, is prepared from day one on this stick. It’s marketed as quicker and extra streamlined, which it claims will provide help to get to what you need to watch quicker.
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This stick additionally debuts a brand new accessibility function referred to as Adaptive Show, which enlarges small menu objects to make them simpler to learn. You may want to show this on manually, however it additionally scales different parts, comparable to cowl paintings, to make sure the enlarged design appears to be like intentional.
There are additionally Alexa+ options in-built in the event you subscribe to Prime, which is able to provide help to get personalised suggestions on what to look at by asking the AI-powered device questions.
The brand new Fireplace TV Stick HD remains to be $34.99 and obtainable to buy now.
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