TiviMate IPTV Player: The Complete Setup Guide for 2026

TiviMate is the IPTV player most people settle on once they have tried a few. It does one thing, live television with a proper TV guide, and it does it faster and more cleanly than anything else on Android TV. This guide covers the whole job: installing it, adding your IPTV line, getting the Nordic TV guide right, and deciding whether the paid version is worth it.

What TiviMate is (and what it is not)

TiviMate is a player, not a service. It ships with no channels at all. You bring a playlist from an IPTV provider (an Xtream Codes login or an M3U link) and TiviMate turns it into a cable-style TV guide. Any provider that gives you one of those two works with it, NorvikTV included.

It runs on Android TV and Google TV devices: the Fire TV Stick and Fire TV Cube, Nvidia Shield, Chromecast with Google TV, Android boxes, and televisions with Android TV built in (Sony, Philips, TCL and others). It does not run on Samsung (Tizen), LG (webOS), Apple TV or iPhone. For those, use the device guides on our setup page.

Step 1: Install TiviMate

On Android TV or Google TV: open the Google Play Store on the television, search for TiviMate IPTV Player and install it. That is the whole step.

On a Fire TV Stick: TiviMate is not in the Amazon Appstore, so it is sideloaded.

1. Settings → My Fire TV → Developer Options, then turn on Install unknown apps. No Developer Options? Go to Settings → My Fire TV → About and click the device name seven times.
2. Install Downloader from the Amazon Appstore, open it once, then switch it on under Install unknown apps.
3. In Downloader, type the address of TiviMate’s official website and download the APK from there.
4. Install it, then let Downloader delete the APK file. A Firestick has little free space and you will want it later.

Only install it from the Play Store or the official site. “Premium unlocked” APKs from mirror sites are the most common way malware gets onto a streaming stick, and they break at the next update anyway.

Step 2: Add your IPTV playlist

The first time TiviMate opens, it asks you to Add playlist. There are two ways in, and the choice matters.

Xtream Codes (recommended). Choose Xtream Codes login and enter the server address, username and password exactly as your provider sent them, with http:// and the port number in the server address. The TV guide, the movie library and the series library all come across automatically.

M3U playlist. Choose Enter URL and paste the M3U link. It works, but you usually get live channels only, and the TV guide has to be added by hand (Step 3). If your provider sent only an M3U link, the converter on our setup page pulls the Xtream login out of it.

TiviMate then counts the channels and asks for a playlist name. Click Next, then Done. The first load downloads the full channel list and a week of guide data, which takes a minute or two on a large line. Let it finish before you start zapping.

Step 3: Get the Nordic TV guide right

An empty or shifted guide is the most common TiviMate complaint, and the Nordics add a twist: three time zones.

• Norway, Sweden and Denmark are on Central European Time (UTC+1, UTC+2 in summer).
• Finland is one hour ahead of them (UTC+2, UTC+3 in summer).
• Iceland stays on UTC all year and does not change its clocks.

If the guide is out by exactly one or two hours, the data is fine and the offset is wrong. First check the device’s own time zone in its system settings; a stick left on UTC is the usual culprit. If that is right, open TiviMate’s Settings → EPG and adjust the time shift on your guide source until the programme on screen matches the guide.

If the guide is completely empty, check the playlist was added as Xtream Codes. On an M3U playlist, add the EPG link from your provider under Settings → EPG → Add EPG source, then run Update EPG.

Step 4: Make a huge channel list usable

A line with tens of thousands of channels is only useful if you can find things in it. Ten minutes here saves hours later.

• Hide the groups you will never watch. Under Settings → Playlists, open your playlist and use Manage groups to untick everything outside your countries, and move your own country to the top. The guide gets noticeably faster.
• Build a favourites row (Premium). Long-press OK on a channel and add it to favourites: NRK1, SVT1, DR1, Yle TV1 and your sport channels in one place.
• Search instead of scrolling. The search box finds both channels and programmes in the guide, which is the fastest way to find a match.

Step 5: Catch-up, recording and multi-view

Catch-up. On channels that have an archive, scroll back in the guide to a programme that has already aired and press OK to watch it from the start. Useful when the match kicked off before you sat down.

Recording. Go to Settings → Recording and choose where files are saved. A Firestick has only a few gigabytes free, so record to a USB drive through an OTG adapter or to a network folder. Then long-press any programme in the guide and choose Record, including ones that have not started yet.

Multi-view. Several channels on one screen at once, which is handy on a Sunday with Allsvenskan and Eliteserien matches kicking off together. Each window counts as a stream, so check how many connections your plan includes.

TiviMate free vs Premium

The free version is a fair trial: one playlist, live TV and the TV guide. Premium adds what most households end up wanting: favourites, catch-up, recording, multi-view, several playlists and more control over the guide. It is bought through the TiviMate Companion app on an Android phone, as a yearly subscription or a one-off lifetime licence.

If you watch mostly live TV, Premium is the best money you will spend on the whole setup. If you mostly watch films and series, a player with a stronger on-demand library, such as IPTV Smarters Pro, may suit you better.

Is TiviMate the best IPTV player?

On Android TV and Fire TV, for live television, yes. It has the fastest guide and the most television-like experience available. It is not the best at everything: there is no version for Samsung, LG or Apple devices, film and series browsing is basic, and the useful features sit behind Premium. A sensible household setup is TiviMate on the main television and IPTV Smarters on phones and tablets, all running off the same line.

Quick fixes

• “Playlist could not be loaded”: a typo in the server address, a missing port, or https where the server wants http. Copy and paste instead of typing on the remote.
• Buffering: under Settings → Player, raise the buffer size to Large, and move the device to 5 GHz wifi or ethernet. Our IPTV buffering guide covers the rest.
• Sport stutters: turn on Auto frame rate in the player settings so 50 fps channels play at 50 Hz. The Nordic broadcasters all transmit at 50 fps.
• New channels missing: update the playlist from Settings → Playlists.

Every NorvikTV line works in TiviMate out of the box, with an Xtream Codes login and the full Nordic TV guide. Try it on your own television with the free 24-hour trial, or see the plans from $15 a month. For the Firestick side of the setup in more detail, read our Firestick IPTV guide.

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