Oliver Cragg / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Various bits of evidence heavily suggest that Xbox Game Pass could make its way to Android TV soon.
- Since Android TV is just Android, it’s not difficult to imagine Microsoft’s cloud gaming service being there.
- Judging from the evidence on hand, it should only be months or weeks before it shows up.
If you want to stream Xbox games on your Android phone or tablet, you can just head to the Google Play Store. There, you’ll find the official Xbox Game Pass app.
Considering Android TV is just Android, it’s strange that you can’t find a TV-optimized version of the app. However, it looks like that’s going to change soon. We have two strong bits of evidence to suggest that we’ll see Xbox cloud gaming on Android TV in the near future.
Related: Everything you need to know about Xbox cloud gaming
The first piece of evidence comes from Reddit (via XDA-Developers). A Redditor found that when you teardown the Game Pass APK, you can find a banner image for the app that matches what you’d find on Android TV. Since any Android TV-optimized app would need this banner image — and apps not optimized wouldn’t — it’s pretty clear what the intention is here.
The second bit of evidence comes from 9to5Google. The team there found that if you sideload the Xbox Game Pass app, it loads a banner image to the Android TV home screen. The app still isn’t on the TV version of the Play Store and its functionality is still all kinds of wonky, but we can be assured that Microsoft is laying down the proper groundwork.
Judging from this information, we guess we’ll see Xbox Game Pass on Android TV within a few months or even sooner. Stay tuned!
