Every Major Streaming Device Brand Ranked Worst To Best

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There are three major purchases that are vital to the quality of your entertainment center: the TV itself, your sound system, and your streaming device. Most modern smart TVs have streaming capabilities baked in, but the hardware is often pretty bare-bones. It isn't uncommon for even the best streaming platforms to feel laggy and unresponsive due to the TV's relatively low processing power. In these instances, the best solution is to invest in a quality streaming device.

Dedicated TV sticks and streaming boxes are currently available from a wide variety of brands, including some of the world's biggest tech companies. Some of them are designed to offer a budget solution that can turn a "dumb" TV into a "smart" one for just a few bucks, while others have high levels of processing power that promise more responsive interfaces and significant upgrades to audio and video fidelity. With so many different choices available, it's easy for shoppers to find themselves overwhelmed.

There are a lot of different factors to consider when choosing a streaming device brand. Specs, features, pricing, customer satisfaction, and insights from professional reviews can all help determine which of the most popular major streaming device brands is best.

The world's largest online retailer has been making its own line of smart TVs and streaming devices for over a decade. The Amazon Fire line is primarily designed to serve as a budget option that allows buyers to start streaming from their favorite platforms without breaking the bank.

The $34.99 Fire TV Stick HD and the $39.99 Fire TV Stick 4K Select are the more affordable options. Then there are the $49.99 Fire TV Stick 4K Plus and the $59.99 Fire TV Stick 4K Max, which offer more premium performance and features while still keeping to the "stick" form factor. Finally, there's the flagship 3rd Gen Amazon Fire TV Cube. This serves as the platform's premium model, and it has a lot going for it. The device is essentially an Alexa+ smart speaker, a sound box for your TV, and a streaming device all rolled into one. It has Wi-Fi 6E and 4K Ultra HD streaming that's powered by an octa-core 2.0 GHz processor that promises double the speed of the Max.

Consumer Reports ranks the Fire TV Cube very highly, tying it for the third-place spot with another device on the publication's list of the highest-rated streaming devices. Consumer Reports determines its rankings by testing things like ease of use, picture quality, and data privacy. What Hi-Fi? and PC Mag have both given the sticks exceptional scores as well. While the devices themselves are solid, the one major drawback is the operating system. The Fire TV OS is bogged down with an incredible amount of ads and sponsored content. Anthony Marcusa of Pocket-Lint stated that this ad bloat made it so that he wouldn't use a Fire TV device even if he got it for free.

Google is a difficult brand to rank on the merits of streaming devices alone. On the one hand, Google TV is easily one of the best major smart TV operating systems out there. On the other hand, this list is about ranking the devices themselves and not just the software they come with. This is further complicated by the fact that, now that Chromecast has been discontinued, the company currently only has one hardware model on the market: The Google TV Streamer 4K.

This streaming box launched at $99.99, but the price has since been reduced to $79.99. It's certainly an impressive device, with 4K 60 FPS streaming capability and several features like Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos. It also benefits from being able to seamlessly integrate into any Google Home smart system, allowing you to do things like issue commands to smart devices and view smart security camera feeds.

There's nothing wrong with the Google TV Streamer 4K, per se, but its moderately high price point and the fact that it's Google's only device available right now can make the brand as a whole a bit of a hard sell. The Streamer 4K occupies a shaky middle ground between the budget options and high-end streaming machines that outperform it. Consumer Reports ranked it as the sixth-highest-rated streaming device. FlatPanelsHD did some extensive testing and found that, while it's more capable than most budget options, its performance and feature improvements over the previous Chromecast generations will appeal to smart home enthusiasts more than those seeking a top-of-the-line entertainment machine.

Onn is an exclusive Walmart brand and a relative newcomer to the wider tech space, with its first streaming devices launching in 2021. In the short time that it's been the retailer's primary tech brand, a wide range of products have become available with a heavy focus on value. Most of Onn's streaming devices aren't intended to top the charts in performance and feature sets, but rather to provide an affordable alternative with upper-middleweight capabilities.

Onn has no less than five streaming devices currently available: The incredibly affordable $14.88 Onn Full HD, the $24.88 Onn 4K, the $39.98 Onn 4K with Gemini, the $44.73 Onn 4K Pro, and the $49.98 Onn 4K Plus. With such a broad range of options being available for less than $50 and all of them coming with Google TV interface software baked in, it's easy to see why these have become so popular so quickly.

All of Onn's devices have star ratings in the 4.4 to 4.6 out of 5 range, but what's more impressive is the fact that the Onn 4K Pro earned the same overall score as Amazon's much more expensive Fire TV Cube in Consumer Reports' rankings. This top-of-the-line, yet still extremely affordable model has Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos, Google Assistant, and Wi-Fi 6 capabilities. Will Greenwald of PC Mag gave this model the publication's Editor's Choice award, stating that it was the best option for getting Google TV, even surpassing the device made by Google itself.

If reliability is your biggest concern, then there are few brands that can match Roku's reputation. The company is best known for its pared-down, minimalist operating system, which gives users a clean interface that is devoid of clutter and minimizes lag. Some critics argue that it looks a bit dated compared to other streaming devices, but others like that it gives users a simple, customizable grid of applications rather than trying to advertise to them or guess what they're going to watch next.

Roku currently offers five streaming devices: the $29.99 standard HD Roku Streaming Stick, the $39.99 Roku Streaming Stick Plus, the $49.99 Roku Streaming Stick 4K, the $99.99 flagship Roku Ultra, and the $99.99 Roku Streambar SE, which is actually a combination 4K streaming box and soundbar. Those prices aren't exactly firm, either. These devices often drop below MSRP. At the time of writing, the Roku Ultra is going for $79.00 on Amazon. While all of Roku's devices are fairly competitive at their price points, the Ultra is the real star. The company promises 30% faster speeds, Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos, the Roku Voice Remote with backlit buttons, WiFi 6, and compatibility with Roku Smart Home, Apple AirPlay and HomeKit, Google Home, and Alexa.

The Roku Ultra is Consumer Reports' second-highest-rated device, while the more budget-oriented 4K streamers are ranked near the top of the "stick" streaming device category a bit further down. CNET gave the Ultra a 7.9 out of 10 in their review, stating that it's powerful, but trails just behind the Apple TV. Meanwhile, TechRadar absolutely loved it, calling particular attention to the speed, versatility, and cool remote.

The third-generation Apple TV 4K is widely regarded as a device that will give you one of the best streaming experiences available. This is, of course, most appealing to those who are already immersed in the Apple ecosystem, but that doesn't mean others can't enjoy its powerful streaming capabilities for themselves.

Like Google, Apple doesn't bother attempting to compete in the budget "streaming stick" space. It has two models (or rather, one model with two designations). There is the Apple TV 4K 64 GB, which goes for $129 and is Wi-Fi only, or you can get the Apple TV 4K 128 GB, which is $149.00 and has Wi-Fi and Ethernet as well as Thread networking support. Both have Apple's super-fast A15 Bionic chip at their core, and both come with the Siri remote.

These are a bit lower on the Consumer Reports ranking, taking positions six and seven with matching scores. This lower placement is largely attributed to its slightly more challenging interface, though pro reviewers consistently rate it as one of the best options available. CNET gave these models an 8 out of 10, TechRadar gave them a 4.5 out of 5, and What Hi-Fi? gave them a perfect 5 out of 5 in their respective reviews. Price was consistently the biggest complaint, but all seemed to agree that the A15 chip offers the best processing power in class, making the interface fast and responsive. It also has robust app support, though they noted that many features are Apple exclusives and might not be as useful to those who primarily have devices from other brands.

Nvidia is probably best known as a graphics card manufacturer, but the company also makes a couple of really great streaming devices, with the big one being the Nvidia Shield TV Pro. This is among the most expensive options on the market, running a whopping $199.99, but there is a reason that it's at the top of the heap. The Pro offers 4K HDR, Dolby Vision, Dolby Atmos, AI 4K upscaling, access to thousands of apps in the Google Play Store, and GeForce Now gaming. There is even a workaround using the third-party apps Sunshine and Moonlight to stream PC games from your computer to your TV. It's also widely acknowledged as the best device for local networking if you'd like to set up a home media streaming server. It's powered by the Nvidia Tegra X1+ processor, which is very powerful, if lagging just slightly behind Apple's newer A15.

The original Nvidia Shield TV seems to have been quietly phased out and has all but disappeared from retailers' inventories, but the Pro is still around, and it adds more RAM, additional storage space (16GB), two USB ports, and the ability to function as its own Plex server. 

There is some debate as to whether Apple or Nvidia deserves the top spot, but the Nvidia Shield Pro is Consumer Reports' top choice for a 4K streaming device. Even the standard Shield TV isn't far behind it, in fifth place. TechRadar gave the Pro a 4.5 out of 5. The 4K AI upscaling, native Android UI, Google Assistant compatibility, and Nvidia gaming options all impressed the reviewer, while expense seemed to be the biggest deterrent.

The qualities that determine the best streaming device will vary from person to person. Those who are more interested in value might be better suited to a different device than those who are willing to pay a premium for top-of-the-line performance. Likewise, those who are already invested in the Apple ecosystem might prefer one of its devices over those that support Google Home features and vice versa. As such, there is no singular "best" brand or device for everyone, but there are some that excel across multiple categories.

In composing this list, we sought to choose brands that were the best in their class for a range of different kinds of users and then ranked them based on a balance of several aspects, including value, the range available in their product lines, features, customer satisfaction, and the opinions of professional reviewers. We started by looking at the Consumer Reports ranking and then gathered information on specs, features, pricing, and professional review scores before ranking our findings.