Instagram for TV is expanding to Samsung smart TVs across the United States, making the app available on the majority of connected TVs in the country. Meta announced that the expansion comes with several new features, including interest-based channels, phone-to-TV casting, and the ability to watch Stories on the big screen.
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The launch on Samsung covers smart TVs from the 2020 model year and newer. Instagram for TV first launched on Amazon Fire TV devices in December 2025 and then expanded to Google TV in February 2026. With the addition of Samsung, the app reaches the three largest connected TV platforms in the US market.
More important than device expansion is what Meta has planned for the future. The company said it is looking at longer video formats for the TV app, including episodic series that evolve into multiple episodes and live broadcasts on TV, which would bring live creator streams to the big screen for the first time.
The series format builds on a feature that Meta began testing on mobile earlier this month. On June 2, the company began rolling out “Series” to select creators on Instagram and Facebook, allowing them to group Reels into consecutive episodes with a dedicated hub on their profile. Viewers who discover an episode in their feed can tap to watch the entire series, save it, or follow for updates.
Meta told TechCrunch that it’s looking at ways to monetize the Series feature, but didn’t share specific details. The company is also testing a dedicated space for horizontal videos within the TV app, acknowledging that content designed for phone screens doesn’t always translate well to a 55-inch screen.
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The new channels feature organizes Reels into categories based on interest, such as comedy, sports, music, and trending content, making it easy to browse without having to have a specific creator in mind. Cast allows users to send Reels from their phone to their TV with a few taps, including videos from the Saved tab, a feature already available on Fire TV and Google TV.
YouTube held a 13% share of total U.S. television viewing time according to Nielsen 's Media Distributor Gauge , the largest share since the metric began tracking in 2023. YouTube's connected TV business is growing faster than any traditional streaming service, and every minute a viewer spends watching Reels on a TV is a minute not spent on YouTube or Netflix.
TikTok has its own content quality issues, with a recent study by Kapwing finding that nearly 60% of videos appearing on new accounts are AI-generated and worthless. Instagram’s push into the living room comes at a time when its main short-form competitor is facing content credibility issues, potentially giving Meta an opportunity to position Reels as the higher-quality alternative.
Meta is investing heavily in creators to fuel its content pipeline. The company launched Creator Fast Track in March, paying established TikTok and YouTube creators up to $3,000 a month to post Reels on Facebook. In 2025, Facebook paid creators nearly $3 billion through its monetization programs, a 35% increase year over year, with 60% of that going to Reels.
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The living room effort also represents Meta’s second serious attempt to bring Instagram to TV screens. IGTV launched in 2018 as Instagram’s answer to YouTube, offering videos up to an hour long, but the feature was a high-profile failure. Only seven million people downloaded the standalone app, Instagram removed the IGTV button from its home screen within 18 months, and the format was quietly discontinued.
