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User profile for user: xDrew87x
xDrew87x Author
User level: Level 1
15 points

Apple TV 4K Having trouble playing some purchased movies.

I can play some of my purchased movies, but other ones I can’t. This problem happens in both the Apple TV app and the movies app. The movies with issues just have a loading wheel that never stops on the movies app, while in the Apple TV app, there is no loading wheel, just a blank screen. The previews work fine for all movies. My internet is fine, as there are movies that play fine. I can play the movies that have issues on my iPad fine, so my Apple account should not be the issue. I have 2 Apple TV 4K devices as well as some older 3rd generation Apple TV’s. This problem seems to happen across both models of Apple TV. A movie I watched 3 weeks ago now won’t play.

I first noticed the problem a couple weeks ago...


I have tried the following with no success.

  • Automatic updates are on and I’m up to date with version 14.4 (18K802)
  • System Restart
  • changed the movies and TV app to play the video quality to “better”
  • changed to 1080P resolution
  • turned off quick start
  • cleared my search history
  • cleared my play history
  • Turned off home sharing (This prevented the Movies app from working altogether)
  • changed my DNS settings to 4.2.2.1


Any help would be appreciated.


Posted on Mar 29, 2021 9:10 PM

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9 replies
User profile for user: bl-support
bl-support
User level: Level 1
15 points

Mar 29, 2021 10:09 PM in response to xDrew87x

I'm currently having this problem too (Mar 29, 2021), and others have reported the same problem on Reddit.


My internet is working fine, and other apps on my Apple TV are working fine too. I just can't play my purchased movies. I suspect it's some Apple TV-specific problem with Apple’s CDN (content delivery network).


Apple reps, do you have any suggestions?

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User profile for user: Rentoc
Rentoc
User level: Level 1
13 points

Mar 30, 2021 4:31 AM in response to xDrew87x

I also made a post about this. I thank you for the play/pause suggestion. That has worked for me also to get movies to play. But it bypasses the movie menu screen. So i still have no way to access extras. This is a great workaround to just play the movie but something is still broken. Any movie that has a menu wont load it.

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User profile for user: xDrew87x
xDrew87x Author
User level: Level 1
15 points

Mar 30, 2021 8:42 AM in response to Rentoc

This seems to be tied to all the movies with menus for iTunes extras and special features. A movie I watched this last weekend now has the same issue.


I saw on other threads, in addition to the play/pause button working the Siri command to play a movie will also work. I don’t use Siri, so I can’t confirm. Both options however bypass the menus, so access to iTunes extras is still a problem.

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User profile for user: xDrew87x
xDrew87x Author
User level: Level 1
15 points

Mar 30, 2021 8:54 PM in response to xDrew87x

Update - I called tech support this morning to report this problem. We tried a system restore on one of my 4K devices, but that didn’t fix anything. When I got home tonight the problem was gone on both the recently system restored unit and the unit I hadn’t done a system restore to. I assume Apple has fixed and distributed an update for this.

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Apple TV 4K Having trouble playing some purchased movies.

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