Getting a VPN working on a television has historically been more friction than it should be - slow menus, awkward keyboard entry, and protocol options buried several screens deep. ExpressVPN's newly updated Apple TV app, now available on the App Store, addresses those pain points directly with a redesigned home screen, quick-access favourite locations, a built-in speed test, and three additional VPN protocol choices. The changes are incremental on paper but meaningfully different in practice for anyone who uses their Apple TV regularly with a VPN.
Why TV Interfaces Make VPN Apps Harder to Use
A VPN app on a phone or laptop benefits from a touchscreen or trackpad, making it straightforward to tap through menus, type a location name, or toggle a setting. A television remote offers none of that. Every additional screen or input step compounds the effort, which is why VPN apps on TV platforms have often lagged behind their mobile counterparts in usability.
Apple TV runs tvOS, a platform with its own distinct interface conventions. Apps that simply port their mobile layout to tvOS tend to feel clunky - designed for fingers, not directional controls. ExpressVPN's update takes the opposite approach: the redesigned home screen consolidates the connection toggle, the selected location, the active protocol, recent connections, and saved favourites into a single view. Nothing important requires a second menu. The visual hierarchy mirrors the iOS app, which matters for users who switch between devices and expect consistency.
Favourites, Protocols, and Speed Testing in Detail
The most immediately practical addition is the promotion of favourite locations to the home screen. Saving a location as a favourite is not a new feature, but previously those favourites lived inside the Locations menu - accessible, but not front and centre. Now they appear as quick-access tiles on the first screen a user sees when opening the app. For someone who regularly connects to two or three specific locations - a home country server for streaming, a particular city for lower latency - this removes several steps from what was already a routine action.
The protocol expansion is worth understanding in context. A VPN protocol is the set of rules that governs how encrypted traffic travels between a device and a VPN server. Different protocols involve different trade-offs between speed, reliability, and how well they function on congested or restrictive networks. The Apple TV app previously offered Lightway, ExpressVPN's proprietary protocol, alongside an automatic selection mode. The update adds WireGuard, a widely respected open-source protocol known for its lean codebase and strong performance, as well as OpenVPN in both UDP and TCP variants - the latter being particularly useful on networks that restrict UDP traffic.
For most users, the Automatic setting - which remains the default and recommended option - will handle protocol selection without requiring any input. The additional choices exist for those troubleshooting a specific network problem, working in an environment with unusual traffic restrictions, or who simply have an informed preference. Having those options available on a TV app, rather than only on mobile or desktop, closes a gap that technically inclined users had noticed.
The built-in speed test rounds out the update. It benchmarks server performance from within the app, giving users a direct read on whether a particular location is underperforming and whether switching to a different server would help. Previously, diagnosing a slow connection on Apple TV meant either tolerating it or cross-referencing performance on another device. Running the test without leaving the app is a small convenience with a real quality-of-life payoff.
The Broader Push to Make Privacy Tools Accessible
There is a wider pattern here worth acknowledging. VPN adoption has grown substantially over the past decade, driven by greater public awareness of data collection, streaming geo-restrictions, and the risks associated with unsecured networks. Yet usability has often been the limiting factor - particularly for non-technical users who understand why a VPN might be useful but find the configuration too cumbersome.
Living room devices represent a specific usability frontier. Streaming is one of the primary reasons consumers use VPNs, and the television is the primary streaming screen in most households. An app that is technically capable but awkward to use on that screen will see lower adoption and less consistent use. Updates like this one - focused not on adding capabilities from scratch but on surfacing existing ones more accessibly - reflect a maturing approach to product design in the privacy tools space.
The update is available now. Existing subscribers can get it by opening the App Store on their Apple TV, finding ExpressVPN, and selecting Update. No additional configuration is required beyond the update itself.
