Sky Go and Now TV users might want to hold fire on updating to Android 5.0 as the streaming services don’t work with the new OS.
Google’s Lollipop update, which is due to start rolling out any day now, currently causes the Sky Go, Sky Movies and Now TV Android apps to either deliver a poor streaming experience or crash altogether.
Developers encountered issues with the latest version of the Android 5.0 SDK (software development kit) that meant the media player used by Sky’s on-demand apps wouldn’t work as it should.
While teams are working hard to resolve the issue, Sky is currently advising customers to not update to Android 5.0 until the issues have been resolved.
New devices including the Nexus 6 and Nexus 9 that come with Android 5.0 Lollipop pre-installed won’t be able to download any of the apps from Google Play.
While attempting to play Now TV content on your Lollipop-updated phone will cause the app to crash, a forum post from a Now TV community manager says that you should still be able to access Now TV content via Chromecast.
In the meantime, Sky is hard at work on getting the Lollipop snag sorted. Early adopters who want to help out can register here to be included in a trial of the bug fix.
Android updates have caused headaches for TV streaming services in the past. The BBC admitted last year that its Android development team for iPlayer was three times the size of its iOS team.
Sky’s managing director for product design and development Alun Webber has spoke of problems relating to Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich, which saw Sky having to develop separate phone and tablet Sky Go apps.
It’s not yet known if Android 5.0 Lollipop is causing other streaming services to crash or not work properly.
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