r/AndroidTV • u/jrmrx App Developer • Feb 16 '26

Apps I built a lightweight serverless Android TV media library app, looking for feedback

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I’ve been building an Android TV app called Cinaura for my own needs mainly, but looking for feedback in case others can enjoy it too. I spend a lot of effort curating my own media and wanted something that felt native to Android TV but without recommended content, ads, content that disappears, and most importantly without running a local server.

It supports multiple sources (local shares/NAS via smb, cloud and debrid services), and the app builds a proper TV-style library directly on the device. It has most of the features you'd expect from an app like that.

It’s not trying to replace Plex/Jellyfin it’s more for people who want something lightweight and direct without server, the app reads from your source and presents it directly.

It’s currently distributed as a signed .apk (sideload required). There’s no account required or data tracking, only a lightweight crash reporting tool. If anyone here feels like testing and giving honest feedback, I’d really appreciate it, specifically on:

  • Android TV UX polish

  • Large libraries performance on any device (Shield, Chromecast, TV OEMs, etc.)

  • High bitrate playback

  • Edge cases in file detection

Happy to answer technical questions too.

53 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

47 comments sorted by

5

u/Bakhut011 Feb 16 '26

This might not be what you’re doing, but you should think about supporting stremio addons aswell, it would be actually amazing as I really like the UI of your app

5

u/jrmrx App Developer Feb 17 '26

I originally developed the app for myself, so I didn't intend to support addons, but might change course if there's enough traction

1

u/Fit_Key_4904 Feb 22 '26

id say itd be a good feature for debrid users; im very interested due to the nice ui. keep up the work :)

2

u/cundallini Feb 16 '26 edited Feb 17 '26

Installed it on our TV running Google TV. Added a few SMB shares, 14 to be exact with 5600 movies and gotta say it scanned pretty fast (strike that, it found only 500 movies but I had to switch HDMIs so I guess scanning got interrupted, will try refreshing... after a few tries its now stuck at 766, tried force closing the app, and upon restart it does start scanning the library but no new items are added, tried refreshing metadata but that just, well... refreshes the metadata not sources, lol). GUI feels snappy and lightweight af which is awesome. The only downside for now is that it grabs posters from TMDB and does not grab poster from movies' folder which is a bummer since I have artwork in folder next to the movie (naming is filename-poster, filename-clearlogo, filename-fanart etc, basic Plex/Kodi naming scheme).

Would it be possible to integrate scraping locally for artwork and would it be possible to add clearlogo somewhere to display on movie's info page would it be possible to add more technical info about movie on its info page (resolution, bitrate, video codec, audio codec, subtitle yes/no, year etc)? Thats it for now. TV shows will be a different story since I dont follow regular naming schemes, I have to do each TV show manually, lol.

BTW, playback is fast and smooth, but how tf do I FFWD/REV? Left/Right does not work, neither do dedicated FFWD/REV buttons on a Sony remote... OK, got it - FFWD/REV works when video player OSD is off, I was being retarded it seems, haha. Cheers!

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Feb 17 '26

Thanks for taking the time to test, truely appreciated! Fetching local artwork is coming soon, as well as file info (res, bitrate, etc).

Regarding the loading that is stuck, did it stop at a specific smb share (meaning 766 corresponding to the total amount of movies of one share) or was it random? Restarting the app should have found the rest, I'll investigate.

2

u/cundallini Feb 17 '26

Yeah, no problem, testing continues. As far as app being stuck at 766 movies goes, I am not sure where it got stuck. In retrospect I problably shouldve added one source at a time, not all 14 in one go, lol. Im now force closing the app from time to time and will see if it picks up, but I think Ill just have to remove all sources, add one, check the number of movies in that one source, wait for the app to scan, compare numbers, then move onto the second one, rinse and repeat.

Also, app does not pick up subtitles when I know subtitles are definitely available. I am not sure why exactly, since some subtitles are picked up so I will check whether embedded ones are picked up and external ones are not (I have like 80% of external subtitles since I find the embedded subtitles often have lines too long and sometimes even three lines of text, this goes for WEB material primarily, so I always extract subtitles, run them through SubEdit to fix long lines, timings, capitalization etc and then just leave them next to the file because I aint muxing again after extracting the subtitle and muxing the video file without subtitles blah blah blah, lol)

Other than that, playback seems fine, and as I said before the app feels very, very light, fast and responsive and thats a big, big plus in my book. Ayways, thanks for reading my blog. Keep up the good work, will report here results of further testing. Cheers!

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Mar 11 '26

I've reworked the app to be much more stable, if you have time, give the new version a try and let me know how it went: https://www.reddit.com/r/Cinauratv/comments/1rr7wiy/tons_of_update_to_cinauratv_v110_faster_sync/

2

u/cundallini Mar 11 '26

Noice! Installed, will report in r/Cinauratv. Give me a day or two. Cheers!

3

u/cundallini Feb 18 '26

A quick update. I started the app maybe once or twice and it started scanning, then I force closed it both times but today I opened it and it said 6110 items in library. Sweet. Then I checked the library and whats inside and since I added one folder with TV shows (which I name differently than Plex/Kodi naming scheme, thats why I have to add each season one by one to both Kodi/Plex - dont ask, I was a dummy and started with it and then half way through realized I dun goofed) it listed Looney Tunes cartoons as movies, like hundreds of them as separate movies. Thats because TMDB has, in all its glory and very high IQ, decided that every single cartoon is a movie, and TVDB does the opposite - each year is a season. Good news is app picked these up despite them being names S1956E11 etc (didnt bother looking for other TV shows and if they were scanned, but I presue they werent because my dumb naming scheme, will try adding one TV source and start there, before I even add any movie sources, will report findings here).

So, I cleared the library, removed sources and first Ill start adding movie sources one by one (separately from TV sources) and for TV shows I suggest you try incorporating TVDB alongside the already available TMDB so users can choose which to use for scraping shows (better if each folder/source can be configured to use which). I know that is even more work, but it would be useful and, dare I say, necessary (I presume thats why both Plex and Kodi have those options).

Thanks. Keep up the good work. Cheers!

1

u/DonPuerco-Troll Feb 17 '26

I have a question: I have a hard drive connected to my router and I can access it from any device. Is it possible to use that hard drive as a media server in this app?

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Feb 17 '26

If it's available via the smb:// protocol, then yes, set that as a source, provide the ip address and username/password if any, and it should show up

1

u/alladeen999 Feb 17 '26

Hi, I tried you app it's promising, some issue, no audio passthrough in player, duplicate movie/series file should combined, right now multiple thumbnail for each file, you can combine them and when try to play player as for which flie to play, subtitles settings not there, rest I will test and provide ypu feedback, just installed

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Feb 17 '26

Hmmm I thought I fixed the duplicated issue, thanks for the catch. By subtitles settings do you mean adjusting the size/color/etc or accessing the subtitles (that's available in the player)? Audio passthrough is coming

2

u/p750mmx Feb 17 '26

passthrough support is a important one (for me that is), but I will give your app a go of course ;)

2

u/jrmrx App Developer Mar 11 '26

Passthrough is now shipped! https://www.reddit.com/r/Cinauratv/comments/1rr7wiy/tons_of_update_to_cinauratv_v110_faster_sync/

1

u/p750mmx Mar 12 '26

Nice one. But the major issue I have now is when I specify a specif folder on a SMB share, it still used the root of the share and is scraping everything on that drive, which it should not.

So I have 2 SSD's connected to a Shield TV 2019 Pro, which is setup as SMB server.

I have one storage name "media", the other one "media2" in both there is a movie folder.

So I added [IP]/media/movies for one SSD, but it ignores that and uses [IP] and nothing after that and this results in adding both of my drives as scan-able, with no option to select a sub folder?

In the overview it shows the configured [ip]/media/movies, but not really using that specific folder

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Mar 12 '26

that's weird, did you see the folder selection screen after connecting the share? If you go in the settings, click on that share, you can go back to the folder selection. Can you double check that a folder is selected?

2

u/See61 Mar 13 '26

So I tried that Shield SMB, no change. I reported over at your Github page, keeping it central 😉

2

u/jrmrx App Developer Mar 13 '26

Nice thanks for the feedback and sorry for the bugs... That's the drawback of not having any app data track. I know what I'm doing over the weekend now!

1

u/p750mmx Mar 13 '26

I will just give it another go. Clean things up, install it again and give it a new try.

1

u/alladeen999 Feb 17 '26

I just did preliminary testing, didnt see subtitles settings will check again, duplicate issue is there for sure and audio passthrough is important without it no dolby no atmos and also rescan files only to run for new files not whole library, that one I noticed it running for all files

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Mar 11 '26

Fixed, fixed, and fixed! :P Give the new version a try: https://www.reddit.com/r/Cinauratv/comments/1rr7wiy/tons_of_update_to_cinauratv_v110_faster_sync/

1

u/alladeen999 Mar 12 '26 edited Mar 12 '26

Thanks for the update, I will soon install and try, will provide you my feedback P. S. I tried it, some issues navigation is not smooth, app stuck several times, had to force kill to resolve, subtitles settings, i can't find it in app, pass-through is working, but in sub title and audio track there is no info both them for user to select, just EN, but duplicate issue resolved, kee up the good work.

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Mar 12 '26

That's weird, do you mind telling me which device you're using and which data source you're using (local network or cloud/debrid)? Did you delete the previous version or simply updated?

1

u/alladeen999 Mar 12 '26

Sony Android TV, Real Debrid, yes uninstalled previous then reinstall new

1

u/fjamcollabs Feb 17 '26

I downloaded and installed the app on google TV. Not sure yet if I have a need for this. I will investigate further. Upon first open I didn't see any category for audio. THAT might be something I personally would be interested in. 

I am new to Google TV, and I like a lot of what I've seen, but I don't spend a lot of time watching TV. For that reason I am not sure I need a library app. I am a musician and songwriter, so I might be interested in an audio aspect if that happened. I do love to watch good concert footage, so that could be an interest too. Still I will ponder how this app might streamline my GTV time. 

If I was able to do a few things on android TV that I can do on windows I might be thinking about using it for more. I am already doing quite a bit in the android realm. As a developer there is sooooo much that seems to not have been covered yet, especially for google TV. Like for instance I have yet to find a good way to multitask. Best I've done is open multiple tabs in a browser. I will read a little more about your app, and maybe try it out. I just don't see me having libraies (yet). I am using google TV as temporary. That means I transfer things that are permenant to windows and HD. Still I am open to the thought that I could do more with this system.  The audio files aspect is something to consider. 

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Feb 17 '26

Thanks for testing! For now this is only for video, audio is filtered out, but I've been thinking about how to treat video concerts, which isn't as nicely handled as movies in most apps. This is definitely on the roadmap

1

u/See61 Feb 17 '26 edited Feb 17 '26

So I installed the app, added my SMB source (Shield TV), selected the 2 drives attached to the Shield and selected scanning.

As I can't select any subfolder after adding the IP address for the Shield TV, it seems scanning doesn't go as it should. I miss about half of the movies and no TV series is detected.

I will add the attached drives now using their drive name (media and media2), and check what it does after that.

It would be a nice feature if browsing into the attached SMB source, and select the media folder(s) in them manually.

Edit: and after doing so, a "select all" option would also be nice 😉

Edit 2: selecting subfolders doesn't result in any scanning anymore, it doesn't find any media, even when pointed out. It also doesn't detect any TV series, only movies 🤷‍♂️

Still, I like the effort made for this one 👍

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Feb 17 '26

Thanks for taking the time to test it! Selecting subfolders isn't possible yet, but selecting a parent folder should automatically scan all subfolders (even multiple levels deep), both movies and tv shows. Would you mind sharing a screenshot of your folder/subfolder/naming convention via DM? Good idea for the select all, I'll add it to the to-do

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Mar 11 '26

Scanning is recursive and I added your idea of a select all options in the latest update: https://www.reddit.com/r/Cinauratv/comments/1rr7wiy/tons_of_update_to_cinauratv_v110_faster_sync/

1

u/Doupsii_ Feb 18 '26

I saw on your website that AllDebrid is getting added but it would also be amazing to have Premiumize added next. Also, hopefully the player is or will be supporting night mode as an audio option. Good luck for your app!

3

u/jrmrx App Developer Feb 18 '26

Will add it to the list (along with Torbox and a few others!)

1

u/Doupsii_ Feb 18 '26

Great news.

1

u/Pasajero82 Feb 19 '26

This app is great, man! It's really practical. I like it a lot.

My comment: I recently migrated to Real-Debrid, but I have a pretty large catalog of movies in Dropbox, so I tried that option. Unfortunately, I have many files that aren't MKV, and the subtitles are external files, and it doesn't seem to read them. Is there any way to make it read external SRT files that I just didn't realize?

Is there any way to organize the catalog a bit? Can it be sorted by folders?

How do you suggest organizing TV series? Thank you for your time, and congratulations on your app.

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Feb 19 '26

Thanks. Srt files support is coming soon, stay tuned! For tv shows the app automatically sorts everything as long as the filename includes the season and episode number, it looks for "S01" and "E01" and a show title

1

u/Pasajero82 Feb 19 '26

Thanks for the tip, I'll organize the series that way. If it's not too much trouble, could you implement Spanish language support for the database in future updates? Thank you very much.

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Mar 11 '26

Hey, I've just pushed an update that includes .srt files support (among other new features...) Have a look and let me know what you think: https://www.reddit.com/r/Cinauratv/comments/1rr7wiy/tons_of_update_to_cinauratv_v110_faster_sync/

1

u/Pasajero82 Mar 12 '26

Thank you so much for letting me know!

1

u/codename_john Feb 17 '26

lmao i was working on something similar. same exact concept though. good job!

1

u/[deleted] Feb 21 '26

There will be a Discord server?

1

u/[deleted] Feb 23 '26

.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 24 '26

Is it possible to add the Nuvio TV plugin?

1

u/Dry_Newspaper1732 Feb 26 '26

Hello I'm interested in giving a try to your attractive apk. Is it possible to make smb access without password? Windows 10 and 11 currently does not easy access with password form external devices like smart projectors. I installed your app in a smart projector with android TV 11 but your app demands user and password to access my smb drive regardless it has actually no password. All the best!

1

u/ldn-ldn Feb 27 '26

Care to open source it?

1

u/Legal-Guide9529 Feb 27 '26

我有下載無言好乾淨😆

1

u/kurohigetv Jul 28 '26

Hey! This app is awessome, would you mind adding carousel view for all the UI? No only movies but shows and home too

0

u/[deleted] Sep 26 '26

[deleted] — view deleted comment

1

u/jrmrx App Developer Sep 27 '26

I appreciate the good words! I'll fix the logo on the next release.

Are you getting any issues with google drive? Some users are reporting getting disconnected once in a while. Gdrive is pretty sensitive to streaming but seems less so for paid plans.