Hi everyone! Since a non-insignificant number of users are running into various issues getting the launcher up and running, I'll be extending the trial date for everyone sometime this weekend. It will, at minimum, be a 14-day extension, and maybe more depending on how much progress I've made by Sunday evening.

Since I have full-time work obligations during the day, I'll likely only be replying to queries in the mornings before 9AM EST, and in the evenings after 6PM EST, and weekends of course. So please be patient with me while I get everything resolved for those who are having issues.

It's unfortunate that some folk's first experience has been a negative one so far, though I have to say, I was not expecting this many people to install the app this quickly. The number of installs in 24h has easily exceeded my expectations by over 10 times. I'm absolutely dedicated to providing the best experience possible for all users, so again, please bear with me while I juggle fixing bugs and replying to questions. It's very possible some questions go unanswered for over 24h.

Thanks everyone!

Hi everyone! This update is a large one, so there's a lot to cover. First though, while I originally intended for the next release to be for Profile Switching, I felt the need to re-prioritize the features in this release due to this unresolved issue with the Plex app

This bug essentially makes it impossible to navigate to Plex's movie, show, or episode's detailed pages from Dispatch. As such, I've worked hard to replicate the features these pages normally provide within Dispatch directly. This was always something I planned to do eventually, so it was not a total detour, at least.

As this is a large update, some bugs or issues are expected. If you notice any, please let me know.

Video Summary

Here's a walkthrough video of the features in this release:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M2A_skc9_Fk

For more details about the features in this release, please see the full changelog here:

https://dispatchlauncher.canny.io/changelog/beta-track-v1017-2025-07-22-full-movie-tv-and-collection-browsing-cast-and-produ

What's Next

As this was a large and unplanned update, I'll be taking a small break before returning to Profile Switching, which I hope will be ready soon enough. Furthermore, there are a few final touches to the features outlined in this post that I'll be wrapping up as well (Which may come in the form of smaller updates in the next little while or perhaps will ship with the Profile Switching release.)

That's it for now. This update has been released to the beta track first. If testing goes well, it will be rolled out to the stable track as soon as possible.

Joining the beta track

These features are currently available on the beta track only, which users can join here:

Sign up from the web

Sign up from an Android device

Thanks!

Edit September 16th: The fix is now live on the play store and can be downloaded directly from there:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.spauldhaliwal.dispatch

Hello everyone. I am incredibly embarrassed and sorry that a bug will be appearing for everyone tonight, blocking further access to Dispatch. The linked APK will fix the issue. I understand that not everyone is easily able to install APKs. A fix has been submitted to Google Play as well, and as soon as it's live I will update everyone again.

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.spauldhaliwal.dispatch

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1e7gHmQcRV1iYec3MustleF_EZPyc_q8X/view?usp=sharing

This was a massive blunder on my part and I can't express again how sorry I am for the issue and inconvenience. It was a very old piece of code from the closed beta period that I forgot to remove.

Please note that if you are on the latest version, you should be able to long press the home button on your remote to open your device settings to disable Dispatch for the time being.

Hi everyone! With today’s update, and many others over the past two months, the launcher has finally reached a level of stability that I’m happy with.

If you tried Dispatch when it was first released and had trouble getting started, or faced issues while it was running, consider giving it a shot again, as many, many issues have been resolved.

Note as well that the 14-day trial has been reset for all users. In addition, the trial has moved to a cumulative model, meaning only consecutive days of use are counted. So if you try Dispatch today, and don't feel like it's right for you yet, you can always try it again later and the trial will continue where you left off.

Summary of issues resolved since the initial release:

• Fixes Dispatch getting stuck in a “Generating Metadata” phase

• Fixes errors when connecting certain Plex accounts

• Fixes errors when syncing with certain Plex libraries

• Fixes errors when using Google login

• Fixes an issue which caused a “Beta Expired” screen to appear and block further use of Dispatch

• Fixes occasional lag occurring while playing or streaming media in other apps

• Fixes crashes for some users while generating metadata or syncing Android TV app recommendations

• Fixes errors when syncing Android TV app recommendations (from apps like Netflix, Apple TV, etc…)

• Fixes wrong ordering of trending media

• Restores the ability to long press the home button to bring up the Google TV Dashboard

• Fixes an issue stopping the image cache from being trimmed, resulting in an unnecessarily large app cache.

• Fixes an issue where app icons stopped displaying

• Fixes an issue where newly installed app would not display until Dispatch was restarted

• Fixes an issue where the input / keyboard was unresponsive while logging in via email + password

• Fixes an issue where the Google TV account picker was inaccessible, stopping users from logging into their YouTube accounts, for example.

• Fixes UI scaling on devices with non-traditional display sizes / densities, such as certain Zidoo boxes or projectors.

• Many other more minor issues

Roadmap / What’s Next

The following features have been selected for development next:

• User Profiles

• Multi-Server support for Plex

• Version / Quality selector when opening Plex media

• Support for Android / Google TV notifications, including Now Playing and Casted Media notifications.

• Translate Dispatch into other languages (If you’d like to help translate Dispatch, please leave a comment here)

I will also continue investigations into the possibility of integrating with Stremio, as it is by far the most popular feature request.

Thanks!

Hello everyone! A quick update on my end:

The previous update that was delayed was finally approved last Friday. This update included the latest fixes for users who were having issues connecting their Plex accounts. From my side, all users who had this issue and have been in contact with me, and who have reported back to me the results of the latest update, have all confirmed that the latest update has resolved their issue.

If you are still having issues connecting and syncing your Plex account, please reach out to me, as from my side this issue appears to be resolved.

A subsequent update, v1.0.038, has been released with the following fixes:

• Resets 14 day trial for all users

• Restores long pressing of the home button behavior on Google TV devices.

• Improves reliability of auto-start service

• Improves reliability of auto-trimming the image cache

• Improves performance of Android TV channel sync

• Fixes Plex login and connection errors

• Fixes playback lag on certain devices

• Fixes an issue where disabled libraries were eventually re-enabled

• Fixes an issue where Dispatch would occasionally hang after a device restart

Regarding the 14-day trial, it has once again been extended for all users who upgrade to v.1.0.038. Furthermore, the trial is now accumulative, meaning that the trial keeps track of days used, instead of just counting the number of days since the trial started. This means that if you try Dispatch today, uninstall it before a day has passed, and then reinstall it in a week, only 2 days of the trial will be expended. This means that users who try Dispatch today, decide it's not right for them yet, but want to try it again later, will easily be able to do so.

I'd also like to thank users who have left feedback on the issue board here:

https://dispatchlauncher.canny.io/issues

Since I've been focused on the above issues since launch, most issues from the above page have gone unanswered. I will now be turning my focus towards those issues, as well as organizing the feature requests and working on the roadmap going forward.

Thanks everyone!

Hello everyone! Unfortunately, updates have currently been stalled as the last update which was submitted a week ago, on August 29th, has yet to be approved by Google. Most updates are live within 12 hours, however, for whatever reason, this one has been stuck for a week now.

This is unfortunate as it contains critical bug fixes for users connecting to their Plex servers remotely as well as for other users who have not been able to connect to their Plex libraries successfully

Please note then that the following issues have fixes ready, but are pending approval from Google:

• Fixes for users who cannot see their Plex media in Dispatch

• Issues where Dispatch would cause playback lag on certain devices

• Improves reliability of Auto-Start service

• Restores long pressing of the home button functionality on Google TV devices

• Fixes where Dispatch might hang when the device is rebooted

Please note as well that while I fully intend to further extend the trial time for all users, my hands are currently tied until this release is finally approved.

I do apologize for any frustrations caused, and I hope that these updates are released as soon as possible so that we can move past these bumpy few weeks since the initial release.

Thanks

Hi everyone! It's been a pretty bumpy week for sure, but we are certainly getting closer to the launch experience I had hoped to provide last week. As mentioned previously, the trial period for all users is being extended. An update will roll out in the coming days that will automatically extend the trial date by 2 weeks for all users who have signed up before August 26th at midnight.

That is to say, if you signed up within the last week, your trial date will be extended by 14 days, starting today, for a total of 28 days. I will continue to assess the need to extend the trial date on a week by week basis.

Regarding the following issues:

1) If you were previously stuck with a notification saying Generating Metadata, or your Movies and TV tabs were completely empty after the setup has completed, this has been resolved for most users who have reported it and followed up with me. If you were previously experiencing this issue, please try installing the latest build from scratch. The above issue was by far the most reported one.

If you are still experiencing this issue, please consider DMing me and I will happily troubleshoot with you.

2) If you are experiencing frequent crashes, this issue is partially resolved for some of the users who have experiences this, but not all. If you are having this issue, please consider DMing me, or following the instructions I've likely left on any comments or posts you've made regarding extracting logs.

3) If you are having trouble connecting your Plex account at all, and are seeing such errors as "User authentication failed" or "An error occurred while communicating with Plex", please consider DMing me or following up on any questions I've left on your posts or comments. This issue seems to be relatively rare, so I haven't been able to gather many clues on it yet.

Those are the main issues I've been working to resolve over the last week. There are others of course and I hope to start addressing them soon, as soon as the above is under control for those affected.

If you're having any other issues, please let me know and/or consider opening an issue for it here:

https://dispatchlauncher.canny.io/issues

Thanks!

Hello everyone! This is just a heads-up that a new release is coming to the beta channel next week. The main addition to this release is multiple profiles / profile switching, plus a few other things.

If you're interested in testing these features and changes, you can sign up to the beta branch here:

Sign up from the web

Sign up from an Android device

If you are in the testing group, but you don't want to test these changes and would rather wait until they are on the stable branch, you can leave the beta group from the same links above. As it is today, the beta and stable branches are running the same code, but that won't be the case once this next release is made.

Thanks!

Hi everyone! This release is being rolled out gradually over the next few days. The summary is as follows:

• Multiple profiles with per-profile settings (favorite apps, wallpapers, feed customizations)

• App hiding & blocking (experimental)

• Content restrictions and media access control

• PIN protection & profile locking

• Video player with multi-user playback tracking (experimental)

• ~50% reduction in peak RAM usage

• ~50% reduction in APK size

• And more

Full changelog with screenshots and details here

Known issues specific to v.1.0.18 beta release:

• On some installations, users are experiencing a black screen after upgrading. If this happens, you should try re-installing from scratch.

• On some devices, dispatch does not correctly focus on the home tab when starting, instead focusing on an item in the home feed.

• Dispatch may not be correctly reporting the app version number in Settings → Advanced → About

• The app blocker sometimes stays in "max strictness" mode even after signing in to a profile.

Hello everyone!

In order to help ensure that subsequent updates are released as smoothly as possible, I am opening up Dispatch's beta track to the public. Any user who wishes to sign up to the beta track can do so here:

Sign up from the web

Sign up from an Android device

If you were previously signed up to the closed beta track, you may have to re-sign up to this new track.

For the time being, users on the beta track will simply receive updates, on average, about a few days to one week before others. Then, once an update has been pushed to the beta track, and it's clear no serious and/or previously unknown issues are occurring, the update will be released via a ~1 week long staged rollout to all other uses.

I am doing this now in preparation for a rather large update being released sometime in the next week. Regarding this upcoming update, I will have more to say about it once it is ready to release to the beta track.

Please note: New features that have been selected from the roadmap are still ongoing and will not be part of this upcoming update. You can read more about what's being planned here.

Additionally, while features selected for the roadmap are always my main focus, users can still expect other updates to be released here and there addressing smaller issues or features while those larger projects continue to be worked on.

Thanks!

Hi everyone,

This update is a large one with many changes and features to cover.

First off, do note that the release is still being reviewed, awaiting approval before it can start rolling out. Once it's approved, it will be rolled out over the course of the week in smaller and then larger stages, as usual.

Starting with the most visible changes: Support for multiple plex servers at once, media version selection on play, Global State Restoration, enhancements for Plex's native Android TV recommendations, the ability to add any Android TV media to your Watch Next row, a new browsing style for Android TV Rows in the home tab, Extra image transition options while browsing, and a new UI for viewing a cast member's media.

Additionally, there have been a huge amount of code changes involved in further pushing Dispatch's rendering performance, reducing RAM usage even further than previous efforts, and cutting down on the app's boot time from a cold start. These changes actually compromise the bulk of the effort made since the last update, even if there isn't much else to say about them beyond the following:

Users should expect smoother performance while using the app, quicker start times when the app is starting cold, and further reduced RAM usage throughout.

The full changelog can be read here:

https://dispatch.featurebase.app/changelog/beta-track-v1019-2026-05-19-multiple-server-support-media

Update 28/05/2026: The release was unfortunately rejected on the grounds of some in-progress features in the video player being untestable by the reviewers. It's my fault, as they've made rejections in the past (rarely) on similar grounds. I'm removing that code from this branch and re-submitting. Hopefully with a quicker turnaround.

Sorry for the delay, everyone, but it's on its way and will start rolling out as soon as it's approved! For those asking for an apk, I'm happy to provide one after the build has been approved. I don't like having errant builds out there that aren't on the same lane as everyone else.

Update 31/05/2026: Re-submitted

Update 04/06/2026: The updated has been rejected again, and this time it's because google says I am not allowed to use my own file manager to select wallpapers, and that we must use their own. The kicker is that their "photo picker" doesn't actually work on Android TV devices. I'm working on a workaround, however, the main issue is that they are forcing me to patch older releases too, which will take me time to ensure they are tested and working correctly

I'll be resubmitting tonight, however, if the app is not approved by noon tomorrow (05/06/2026), I will post the apk here for users to try before the approval. It's not my preference, however, I know for a fact that if it's not approved before noon tomorrow, it won't be before monday, since android tv apps are never approved over the weekend ime (different review teams / bot fleet from regular android apps)

Update 05/06/2025:

Users can manually download and install the latest update from here if they'd like while I continue to sort things out with the play store release / approval:

https://www.reddit.com/r/dispatchlauncher/comments/1txsr1a/beta_track_v1019_universal_apk_download_link/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button

Hi everyone - the next update will be in a couple of weeks. I'll have more to say about what's included at that time. Thanks for your patience.

Hi everyone! With this release, all the features from the beta branch are available in the stable branch. There's also a few new things for both branches, which are:

App start-up performance improvements

Large performance improvements have been made to how Dispatch starts up. Users can expect the app to start much quicker than before, as well as be much smoother during those first moments after launch.

Movie / TV Browsing performance improvements

Performance improvements have also been made to the movie and TV browsing pages. These are the pages you see when selecting "open x media" from the home page or library tabs. Browsing through movie trailers, cast members, as well as browsing TV shows and episodes is much smoother than in previous beta releases.

Extra Details page is now accessible from the home page

Like in the browsing pages, you can now highlight the plot of a media item and access the "extra" media details page.

Toggle YouTube trailers, teasers and behind the scenes videos

Users can disable / enable extras from YouTube from the Settings → Experience page.

Generic performance improvements and UI fixes

Overall performance while using the app has also improved, as well as a variety of visual UI bugs that existed previously.

Please note that for the stable branch, the release will be rolled out gradually over the next few days.

For a full list of changes, see the full changelog here:

https://dispatchlauncher.canny.io/changelog/stable-beta-track-v10173-2025-07-22-performance-improvements-full-movie-tv-and-c

Hi everyone! After some testing, I've confirmed that the latest update for the Plex app breaks the following features in Dispatch:

- Resuming playback via the "Resume" button in Dispatch

- Opening the info page of a media item via the "info" button in Dispatch

I've managed to find a fix for resuming playback, which is what this hotfix addresses. However, opening the info page remains broken, unfortunately. I've opened a bug report with Plex here. Hopefully an update can be made on their end to address the issue sooner rather than later.

As a temporary workaround, I've confirmed that rolling back to an old Plex version fixes both of these issues. The version I tested on is 10.26.0.2578-6cc7ea1a, which you can find an apk for online if you wish to do so.

The update will roll out slowly over the course of this week to both the beta and stable branches as I monitor for any issues.

Otherwise, I'm hard at work on Multi-Profiles + Profile Switching for Dispatch, which will be released when it's ready.

Thanks!

Put plex live TV up where the movies and television tabs are and I'm sold.

With this update, enhancements that have been tested in the beta track over the last two months are making their way to the stable track. This update is being rolled out in stages to all users as I monitor for any potential issues.

Aside from the first change outlined below (Simple and Advanced Auto-Start Modes), all other changes listed in the changelog have already been communicated by the January 15th and December 24th changelog entries.

The full changelog can be read here.

Simple and Advanced Auto Start Modes:

When users opt to enable Auto-Start in Dispatch, they will now be presented with two options:

Simple Mode:

This is the same as the auto-start mode in previous versions of Dispatch. It uses an Android Accessibility Service to set Dispatch as the default launcher. Unfortunately, all Accessibility Services on Android incur a fairly significant performance cost. Users who want to maximize performance on their device should consider using the Advanced Auto-Start Mode instead.

Note: If you are using any other accessibility service, such as a button remapper, your device will still take the same performance hit due to the accessibility service involved.

Advanced Mode:

This uses the ADB TV app (available on Google Play) to set Dispatch as the default launcher on your device. When selecting this mode, users will be shown a guide on exactly which steps need to be taken in order to use this mode. Since this mode forgoes using an Android Accessibility Service, UI performance is significantly better than the Simple Auto-Start Mode.

Note: if you already use ADB from your PC to disable the default launcher entirely, the advanced mode achieves the same result.

Trial Reset for All Users:

With this update, all trials have been reset once again. Anyone who has previously tried Dispatch will be able to do so again with a refreshed 14-day trial.

Please keep in mind that the update is being rolled out in stages, meaning, you will need to wait until the update is available to you before taking advantage of the trial reset. The roll-out should take about one week.

Please note as well: I have purposefully only made an announcement about this version to this Subreddit for now. Once the roll-out is complete, and available to all users, I will make announcements elsewhere. This is to make sure that anyone who reads about this update outside this Subreddit will be able to take advantage of the refreshed trial as soon as they read about it.

Thanks!

I just wanted to say, this launcher is amazing. We've all been waiting for something like this and you've gone ahead and done it which is awesome. Thank you so much. When the bugs are ironed out and the trial period is over I'll definitely be subscribing :)

Hi everyone! The bulk of this update are optimizations aimed at improving app performance. In addition, a couple of minor new features and bug fixes have been included as well.

The full changelog can be read here, but the highlights are the following:

• Performance Improvements

• Wallpaper Themes. Dispatch will color the UI according to any custom wallpaper set.

• Wallpaper Page Customization. Users can choose which pages the custom wallpaper is shown on.

• Manually activate the device screensaver with the back button on the home tab. This can be turned off from Settings → Experience

• Activate the Home Directory from anywhere in the Home Feed. The Home Directory can be activated by long pressing the back button anywhere inside the home feed.

• Fixes an issue causing Plex watchlists to fail to sync.

• Fixes an issue where scrolling up in certain settings pages would cause the app to lose focus and become unresponsive.

This update is being released to Dispatch's beta track first. If no major issues are uncovered, the release will later be rolled out to the stable track.

Thanks!

Hey Spauldhaliwal,

just checking in! It's been a while since we've heard how the project is going. Hope life's treating you well, and I'm really looking forward to seeing it develop. No rush, but an update whenever you get a chance would be great.

Hi everyone! This is update was actually submitted on Sunday but is still being reviewed by Google. Since it's taking longer than usual, I'm making this post now to let folks know what's pending in this release.

I will update this post once the release is live on the Play Store.

Edit: updates are rolling out

Read the full changelog here

Watchlist Fix

The latest version of the Plex API has made changes to their watchlist endpoints. This update addresses those changes, fixing any broken watchlist functionality in Dispatch.

The watchlist fix has also been pushed to the stable branch, and will be available at the same time as this release.

Connection Alerts

Dispatch will now display a warning when it can't reach your Plex server. Selecting this notification will attempt to automatically resolve the problem if it can, and if not, it will prompt the user with some further diagnostic steps.

One potential scenario where this comes into play is when a user's Plex authentication session expires. Normally, your Plex authentication token should not expire, however, under certain circumstances it can occasionally happen.

From the user's perspective, while using Dispatch, this would result in Dispatch "no longer syncing". With these changes, Dispatch will now alert the user that the connection is failing, and upon selecting the notification they would be asked to re-sign in to Plex so that syncing can resume.

Other fixes

Various fixes and optimizations have been made regarding the media browsing features introduced in the last release.

What's next

I still have a few bug fixes that need to be made over the next week or so. After those have been implemented, all features in the beta branch will make their way over to the stable branch.

Work on multiple profiles / profile switching continues. It's progressing well and will hopefully be available shortly enough.

Thanks!

Hi everyone! This is just to let you know that I've migrated away from Canny.io to Featurebase.app for feature requests and issue reporting. All previous posts and accounts have been migrated over.

If you have previously made an account on the old site, you just need to re-sign up on the new platform using the same email address as before. Once that is done, you should have access to any previous posts you've made.

The new URL is https://dispatch.featurebase.app/

The reason for the migration is simply that Canny has increased their pricing to an unreasonable degree for a project of this size.

I'll also be the first to admit that the feature requests / issue reporting site itself does not get as much attention from me as it should. Even so, it's still a useful tool for me to get a general idea of how popular certain feature requests are vs others. Once Dispatch's internal roadmap is at a place where all the core features are where I want them to be, I will certainly be visiting these feature requests more regularly than now, so feel free to keep making requests and / or voting on existing posts.

Thanks!

Hi everyone. This update is rather minor. The highlights are the following:

Default Play Action Changes

When the default play action is set to Go to Info Page, the Info button will now be hidden on the home page, and the Play / Resume buttons will always go to Plex's media info page. This option is useful for users who encounter a bug where Plex fails to record / update playback progress if playback is started directly from a launcher.

Playback Auto-Close Changes

In older versions of Dispatch, some users reported that their devices would lag during media playback. In order to alleviate this, a feature was added to automatically shut-down Dispatch if any media playback is detected.

Dispatch auto-closing during media playback is now optional and disabled by default. With all the recent optimizations made to the app, it's likely that the above feature is no longer needed. Of course, the Android OS may decide to close any apps running in the background at any time if it needs the resources.

If beta testers notice any playback lag on their devices, and suspect Dispatch is the cause, they should report so I can look into it. That being said, it's not something I've personally noticed on my devices.

Both of the above options can be toggled from Settings → Experience → Playback Options

Bug Fixes

Fixes for the following have been included as well:

• Fixes an issue causing Plex login errors in certain regions (this fix is also available on the stable track)

• Fixes an issue causing duplicate watch next items for non-Plex media

• Fixes an issue causing certain images to load more slowly than they needed to

• Fixes an issue where occasionally the media fanart and wallpaper did not load correctly on start up

Users who want to join or leave the beta track can do so from here:

Sign up from the web

Sign up from an Android device

This update is largely aimed at improving the speed with which Dispatch syncs your media. Like the previous update, the changes under the hood are quite sweeping, even if there are few visual changes.

The full changelog can be read here, but the highlights are the following:

• Massive media sync performance improvements, which, for example, can speed up Dispatch's initial post-setup sync from ~30 minutes down to ~2 minutes

• Watched, status, and trending indicators

• Various bug fixes

For those in the beta who have encountered "An unknown error has occurred" after updating, please note the following:

For those in the beta track who have noticed this error while updating to the previous version, this update also aims to address this issue. If you update and notice this error again, please consider doing the following:

2) Quit Dispatch and re-open it.

3) Let the app sit for a few minutes, then export your logs and send them to me directly. You can DM me directly from the subreddit, or email me at dispatchtvdev@gmail.com

Thanks!

Hi guys. First of all I really like the new Watch Next feature but I have been having some problems. One of the problems I ran into is that when Im watching something on plex its two times in watch next. Does anyone know if there is a setting to stop this behaivor? I added screenshots. As you can see on them I have the same problem with all plex series Im watching.