On this page, I’ll walk you through first-time setup of the Xbox app on a Samsung Smart TV. When arriving at the front door of the app (shown here) the first action a player must take is to sign in with an existing Microsoft account or create a new one. Selecting “See the games” gives them the ability to browse the game catalog without an account. Keep in mind that—since a controller isn’t connected yet—all of this is being done using the TV’s remote control.
Once “Sign in” is selected at the front door, it’s time to get set up using a new or existing account. This is done entirely from the player’s smartphone.
After sign-in is completed using a smartphone, the player is encouraged to pair a Bluetooth controller to their TV. Because the TV works with several different brands of controllers—not just Xbox—we added a friendly URL on this screen to let people see the comprehensive list of what’s compatible.
Players are then prompted to select the type of controller they’re pairing. This will generate instructions specific to their controller during the pairing process shown on the next screen.
For this example, the player has chosen to pair an Xbox controller, so we show them custom steps and imagery for putting it into pairing mode.
This is where things can get a little complicated. Selecting “Pair with TV” (shown above) takes the player out of the Xbox app temporarily and into Samsung’s TV settings environment where they must finalize the Bluetooth connection process.
After the connection process is completed in Samsung’s TV settings, the player is automatically sent back to this screen in the Xbox app. The challenge on this screen is that the app doesn’t have the ability to know whether the controller is connected until controller input is received. Unlike on the Xbox console, the player must press a button on the controller for the app to detect it. We also added helper text below the image in case the controller isn’t detected.
This is what the player sees once controller detection is confirmed. We added a line of helper text below the image to reassure players that pairing their controller is a one-time process.
This screen lets players know that the setup process is just about complete.
Some final reminders to help players get the most out of cloud gaming on their smart TV.