Customer Ratings & Reviews

Was initially very surprised and happy with the Tablo TV but I feel that a couple of things could really make this review go to 5 stars. First of all setup was fast and easy on Apple device and seeing that we were now getting 145+ channels with good to great signal—vs just 50 with a lot of variation in signal from just our roof-mounted amplified antenna—in combination with having the ability to rewind live TV made this already worth the relatively low purchase price of $85. Then came the issues. The Tablo app is not supported on older AppleTV’s or Amazon Firesticks so that was a bit of a let down. But considering that the majority of our devices are Roku we still thought it was worth it. A few weeks after installation however we began having issues with the Roku Devices in the rooms furthest from the Tablo unit which is strange because neither of these devices is that far from the centralized location of the Tablo in our small split level home. They would crash over and over again after only a few minutes of watching. I researched and learned that this was a prevalent issue with Roku users and so was strongly considering returning the device but figured I should at least give the troubleshooting tips a shot before doing so. I’m glad that I did as power cycling the Tablo did fix the issue with random crashing at least for the last week. Hopefully this holds up but I guess we’ll see. Other lesser issues I have with the Tablo are that I would like a preview of what is on when cycling through the channel guide and the ability to just surf through the channels without having to go back to the guide. Also, the lack of a visual scrubbing effect when fast forwarding or rewinding through live tv would be very much appreciated. In the end, I am content with the Tablo purchase but not overjoyed. It is a good product if you have only two TVs that would require simultaneous live streaming and works adequately for rewinding and recording shows but could definitely use some functionality upgrades. I am still recommending it to friends and family but always with caveats.

I stopped paying for cable recently, but with football returning this fall, I was interested in an upgrading an old over-the-air DVR that I had --- the result is the 4th Gen Two Tuner Tablo… and it is a GREAT option. First, this isn’t quite what I expected – once you attach an antenna, you can set it up in the best place to reach the giant local network antennas that pump out local/national tv. This was VERY helpful as most of my house faces south, but the network antennas are all to the north. So now I get full signals on all of my local channels --- additionally, there is an amplifier on this device, so it strengthens the signal – either way, I have perfect reception on all of my local stations. So I am new to the Tablo Universe, but apparently, they have just overhauled their graphical interface and recording structure. I have nothing to compare it to previously, but I think it looks great. I recently upgraded to 1GB internet in my home – why does any of this matter? Well, you don’t actually plug this device into your television. The Tablo connects to your wi-fi and then you use an app to watch the programs. This is the best case for me as now I can watch all local channels from anywhere in my house. And because there are two tuners in this DVR, I can pause live games and then switch over to the other game, and it will return to the same spot I was originally. I can even set it up in my garage if I have a project or in the kitchen if I am doing dishes – it’s incredibly convenient. I mentioned a recent upgrade in my internet – well, that required new hardware, and I did not expect to have any issues around my house. Unfortunately, my Tablo was having difficulty connecting, but I was able to connect with a customer service person at Tablo who could see my device, and help me troubleshoot the issue from inside my house – this was on a Sunday and was maybe the most impressive and unexpected benefit of the entire device. They also seem to have a rather vocal reddit community, so I'll be using that as well to see if there are any outages or issues (to determine if it's just my internet or something else). The Tablo Dual has two tuners, which means you can record two shows at the same time. It comes with 128GB of storage, which is about 50 hours of HD recordings and it’s really easy to add another drive to expand up to 8TB. The signal strength reaches as far as your router, which means I can now watch anything around the house that I want --- and a final benefit; there were a lot of unexpected other channels includes like Fubo to watch international soccer that I was not even aware of. Just a cool device that seems like it’s just getting going – excited to see how they improve on this going forward.

I’ve had another competitors system to view antenna TV across my network for a few years, but the software requires additional subscription fees to access basic features, such as a guide and recording capability. So, when I began reading about Tablo, they appeared to offer a newer generation product (the 4th), with built in DVR, a 14 day program guide, and $0 subscription fee to access the feature set. In the box you’ll find the Tablo device, a power cable, and an ethernet cable to connect the device to a nearby router or switch. Installation requires the use of an app, which can be downloaded on the appropriate app store for free, set up an account with basic information to identify your location (for the Guide), and scanning for channels. The device also has the capability to connect to your network wirelessly, but if you have the option to go wired, I’d highly recommend it to avoid buffering or delays in crowded networks. It’s important to point out that Tablo did offer a previous generation service, which did require a subscription, and is now labeled their legacy product. The reason I want to point this out, is because my Sony TV with Android built in, only allowed me to find the “legacy” app. When installed it detects the hardware, but then failed to play. After using the Tablo website, it directed me to the appropriate Play Store app, allowed me to push the install to my TV, and was up and running in just a few minutes. Once installed, the scan process only took a few minutes, finding more channels than my previous device, and immediately began playback when selected on my Android based smart TV. It was quick to download the newest guide for the channels, and since it offers 2 tuners, allows for watching and recording simultaneously for 2 programs. The iOS app also allows you to download and install updates while you’re on the same network, prompting you when launching the app if there is a new one. I found the install process only taking a couple of minutes at most, with the tuners stopping playback while installing. The only con is those that don’t have a Google or Amazon streaming option at the time of release. While it does state that it’s compatible with Apple TV, you can only AirPlay currently, which I found often lost connection or failed to display a picture in the correct orientation making it difficult to view on my TV without using the Android TV functionality built in to the TV. Being a household with all Apple TV’s, I was excepting the Apple TV app to be released alongside the product, and appears to be the only major streaming device currently unreleased as of the writing of this review. However, it works great on iOS, offering near real-time video on all network devices viewing the stream. It will help having a great WiFi or wired network to offer the best picture quality, and you may notice some degradation of the picture while your network catches up. However, I rarely found the need to restart the feed or the app to view, and even left a channel up for several hours on my TV as background noise without ANY issues. The app itself has 3 basic tabs; your library where you can find your scheduled recordings and monitor your storage space, a Home (default view) where you can view current viewing recommendations and upcoming events (like Sports or Premieres), and you’ll also get access to a few digital streaming channels. In the Live tab, you’ll see your guide, along with some of those digital channels that stream instead of using the antenna. So, don’t be surprised when you know you only have 10 antenna stations, but continue to see some mainstream networks show up without a channel number. Overall, this is a great product for those cutting the cable or satellite bill with a decent amount of antenna TV and streaming channels available. You’ll see channels at the broadcasted resolution up to 1080, and even those running at the lowest digital resolution of 480. Browsing the apps on Android TV and on iOS was a great experience, and I only ever had the mobile app crash once. It loads quickly, and provides an option to rewind, pause, and fast forward while viewing. Given the easy setup, broad device support, DVR capability and the features offered without additional subscription fee this is an easy buy recommendation!

The new tablo is a good start to the new generation. I'm simple it works. It's not without it's quirks. Reception is good but a tiny bit weaker than my old Tivo Romano. Interestingly this unit has a built in amplifier that is on by default. Be careful that you don't have interference already, that might make it works. If you have issues just turn it off and retry. The new apps: Menu is perfectly serviceable and basic. No ads or any bull like Tivo is shoving down people's throat. It tends to loose connection on my Google tv. App currently will go to sleep when androidtv powers down. When you relaunch it next time it always can't connect. You have to close and reopen it. I'm sure they will figure it out. This app is completely new compared to what they had. 128gb internal memory stores in mp4 not the og signal. External drives enable mpeg2. Ive had issues with a USB only powered drive. It disconnects sometime after plugging it in. If you want an external drive, make sure it has its own power source. Picture quality is actually really solid. A little better than my Tivo, even after the encoding it's really solid. Pretty happy here. Overall I'm pretty happy with the result. I know it will get continued firmware updates that will further refine the product but even as it is right now, it's absolutely worth the 100 dollars with zero subscription fees.

Great dvr tuner, can record antenna channels and streaming. Has many new feature over the old legacy tuner. Easy setup and has built in dvr that can be expaned with an external hard drive if needed.

I bought the Tablo 4th gen. after we moved to a different house that didn't have coax to the living room for our main TV. Pros: a. Watch OTA TV anywhere you have a supported app (we use Rokus). b. Supports wifi. Streaming OTA TV over wifi works well if you have solid and strong wifi connectivity. c. Doesn't require a TV schedule data subscription. Cons: a. The Tablo internet infrastructure required to deliver the service sometimes experiences unexpected outages that prevent the app from working as expected. b. Requires a good antenna signal. For best results depending on your location, you may want to hire someone to install and position a rooftop or attic antenna. c. The app is easy to use on streaming devices or TVs but you have to scroll a lot if you have a lot of channels. I don't have much to say about the DVR features as we rarely use them. Other than the occasional server outages, it works as advertised. There might be better devices out there but not in Tablo's price range. (Addendum: You can view the status of the Tablo infrastructure services at https://tablotv.com/status).

Works very well very easy to setup. Would recommend for a cheap solution

I have great over the air reception with an antennae, but broadcast TV just isn't very useful to me without a device like the Tablo. Instead of connecting the antennae to the TV it is connected to the Tablo, then a Tablo app on my smart TV connects over wireless to the Tablo. The Tablo automatically scanned all the channels and downloads scheduling data for all channels for the next 14 days. I can search for upcoming shows or movies and set them to be recorded. I can record all episodes of a series. It is quite flexible. I can fast forward through commercials. I can watch a show while it is being recorded. I can even watch on my phone through the Tablo app. It makes broadcast TV way more usable to me. That is all the good news. The bad news is that sometimes I can't connect and have to reboot the Tablo or my TV or both. There are also some quirky behaviors with recording. I set it to record a football game (the primary reason I got it) and it was all set to record, but then it wasn't recording because it said there was a conflict, but there was no way to determine what the conflict was! I disabled all scheduled recordings and then it started to record the game, but I missed the first half. If it wasn't for these quirky things I would have given it 5 stars.

Works as advertised. Adds lots of additional channels and the DVR function works well. I've had occasional playback issues, but restarting the program fixed this. Great for the price.

The Tablo Over-the-Air DVR and Streaming Player is an excellent way to have one central antenna that can be viewed all over the house and on the go! There was a time before SlingTV where you could use a Sling Box to stream your broadcast or cable TV through the web, but in the decade since that disappeared, there really have been few options to view your local stations on the web without a subscription service. This Tablo Player fills that void very nicely and it has an onboard DVR, too! The setup was incredibly easy, just follow the quick start guide, download the app, and connect and antenna! You can either use the onboard wifi or an ethernet cable to connect to the internet, ethernet is recommended for reduced lag and less interference. After you're all connected, the device and app will scan for local stations, just like a TV will do, and tell you what's all available! Using the app is easy, straightforward, but there are some limitations to it. Most seem to be down to licensing rights for streaming TVs but their website does state that support for Apple TV, Samsung, LG, and other smart TVs or boxes will be coming soon! The availability of free streaming channels, DVR functionality, and comprehensive TV guide are all amazing features! I'd recommend this to those looking for an option to stream broadcast channels to devices around their home and on the go without having to pay for a monthly TV subscription!

First off, I assumed this would work with AppleTV since it has the logo on the box (see picture), but AppleTV is not yet supported. “Coming soon with no estimated release date” was what I got from tech support. It does work on iPhones and iPads, but there is no corresponding app for the AppleTV. I was able to get it to work on my iPad, but the video was choppy on multiple local channels. These channels are very clear high definition via my powered outdoor antenna when just plugged into my TV over the antenna. So there are some issues either in the hardware or software. It also let me mirror my iPad to the TV over the AppleTV, but it is only like 3/4" the size of my TV screen. On the positive side, setup was very easy including adding a hard drive for local channel DVR. As for the DVR though the choppiness in the video caused a recording to start stop quite a few times. I recorded a single 2 hour show and it ended up being 7 different recordings. Your results may vary I guess depending on your hardware that you connect it to. Check out the official list of supported devices on the website before you try it in your situation.

Love,it..just as the salesman described. Easy set up, works great. Would definitely recommend.

Over the last 20 years I've had 3 other OTA DVR's and this Tablo is by far the best yet. As technology has advanced my last Channel Master DVR left a lot to be desired. Now having 4 tuners and the ability to start a show on delay while recording, is a feature I really missed. The entire interface is clean and simple. I control mine through my Roku and absolutely love it!

The setup for the Tablo was pretty easy. The 4th generation products are a self contained units; connect it to power, your network, and your antenna and you are most of the way there. I connected it to hard-wired Ethernet so I can't comment of setting it up for WiFi. The Tablo app for your phone walks you thru the setup process. This generally went well with the exception of loading the program guide. That seems to take forever. This is a replacement for a Tivo Bolt that just died and the company doesn't seem interested in the OTA market anymore; time to move on. On balance the Tivo was a bit better, but not enough to justify the monthly fees anymore. The are no fees for 4th generation Tablo devices. The main feature I miss from the Tivo was how smart it was recording something independently of what channel it broadcast on. There have been a couple to times where the Tablo App on the TV couldn't find the Tablo. Changing to a different app on the TV briefly playing a bit of something and then restarting the Tablo app worked for me. I have read that explicitly exiting the Tablo app via its menus helps avoid this problem. All-in-all $99 well spent. I would definitely do it all over again

This is my first experience with a Tablo device. When a show we watched daily ended its long-time syndication run on one of the local channels carried by YouTubeTV, I found that it would continue on the local MyTV channel, but that channel is not carried by any streaming service. So off to the OTA channel world we go! Just at that time, the Gen 4 Tablo device was announced. I got one delivered from Best Buy and set it up same day. Setup was mostly straightforward, but documentation of steps could have been more detailed. Anyway, I got the device set up with the Android app loaded on both my cell phone and tablet, plus the Firestick app on a Firestick 4K Max and a Fire cube. All seemed to go well. Next morning I wanted to do a review of my experience and wanted to include a citation of the number of channels I found in my last channel scan. When I tried to log in to the Tablo on my cell phone, the Android app could not find the Tablo device; None of my 4 apps could find the Tablo device. Long story short, the Tablo apparently was frozen into a state that did not allow wifi connectivity, no Ethernet connectivity, would not reset, nor would it Factory reset to new condition. Tablo sent me a new device overnight and a shipping label to return the defective device. The replacement Tablo Gen 4 device installed just fine, except that I initially connected it to a 2.4 gHz wifi network and the current Gen 4 devices apparently do not include capability to shift to another network (unless maybe with a full Factory reset, which I did NOT want to do.) I reconfigured the location of some devices and was able to connect the Tablo via Ethernet to one of my wifi mesh access point nodes. Since completing that install, picture quality has been mostly good. I have noticed some brief pause glitches on the Android app playback. They have been reported to Tablo and their engineers acknowledge they are working on and solution. I also had some pixelation and decode failure of recordings when played back on a Firestick Cube app, allegedly associated with signal quality. I did another rescan and saved those resultsl so far the daily recording has played back perfectly. So, overall, I think this is a really good device and value for the money to achieve its advertised purpose. There are some capabilities that apparently were available to the "legacy" Tablo devices that are NOT available in the Gen 4 firmware and its associated apps. (And NOTE: the legacy apps of legacy Tablo devices do NOT work with the Gen 4 device. Also, there is not yet a web browser version for the Gen 4, so PCs and Macs are not yet supported.) That is my honest, straight up review of my personal experience. I do recommend the Tablo Gen 4 device, but be aware there can be some glitches to overcome. It is early in the deployment cycle and is not yet , in my opinion, fully 100% plug-and-play. Cheers.

Wanted to be able to watch OTA without antenna cable going to several TVs. After scanning for locals, Tablo also includes some apps in the guide. Dove, Circletv and several more. Easy set up and no need to run antenna cables to each TVs. You can place the Tablo any place in the house as no need to connect to tv. You will have to set up Tablo on your phone then download the app for your streaming device. Then you’re all set. Great purchase.

I really had high hopes for this! The picture quality was just as good as cable or streaming. I loved being able to record live local tv and being able to pause. It was easy to set up and use. It decided not to work after 2 weeks. I hit the reset button several times and did “forget” wifi using the app on my phone 3 times. It would not reconnect and load. I’m hoping the next generation will work better.

Purchased the Tablo along with a Google TV Streamer to take over for an older LG TV that was no longer getting app support. Initially, the Tablo was a bit of a let down. It was nice to be able to install an antenna, upstairs with better line-of-sight to the broadcast antennas but, we could not access the guide, remotely, to schedule recordings (VPN fixed this). Also, this device initially REQUIRED internet access to function so, when our internet provider died, we were left with NO TV unless we moved the antenna down to where we were watching TV. Tablo has recently added "offline" support where you could watch TV when the internet is down.

The device was easy to set-up. I really like being able to record over the air broadcasts. I wish that I had bought this sooner.

This review only applies to ROKU as I have not used it on any other device. Things I like about Tablo 1. Picture quality seems better than antenna 2. No need for antenna for additional tv's 3. Able to record tv programs Things that need to be improved 1. Doesn't remember last channel watched. Because of this channel listing always start at top 2. Channel sound goes off when exiting channel 3. No way to toggle previous channel I have 2 tvs. One uses a ROKU streaming stick that has worked flawlessly. The other uses ROKU Ultra LT that worked fine for a couple of weeks, but now will display a channel for a while and then exit Tablo. Have notified Tablo about this. I'm hoping when AppleTV and LG are available these problems will be resolved.