4 Ways Samsung Tizen Is Better Than Google TV

Tizen OS is the open-source, Linux-based operating system that has powered Samsung's smart TVs since 2015. This impressive OS offers a clean UI, free and on-demand TV, support for all the major streaming apps, and much more, helping make Samsung one of the most reliable smart TV brands on the market, and its smart TVs among the best.

However, one of Samsung's biggest competitors in this space is Google TV. Built on the Android TV OS, Google TV offers its own slew of benefits, including a large variety of apps, built-in Google Assistant, and a focus on content discovery. While these features allow Google TV to provide a personalized smart TV experience, there are a handful of ways Samsung Tizen manages to edge out its competition.

Gamers will appreciate Samsung Tizen's gaming hub, allowing you to play console games on your TV without the need to open a bunch of separate apps. Smart home enthusiasts will value its Samsung SmartThings integration, which supports both Samsung products and select third-party products. Tizen also offers a more streamlined UI than Google TV, and access to an abundance of free films and TV shows through its Samsung TV Plus feature. Below, we break down four ways Samsung Tizen is better than Google TV.

Introduced in 2022, Samsung's Gaming Hub is an all-in-one gaming platform that allows you to stream games directly to your TV, supported in Samsung 4K and 8K smart TVs from 2022.

This integrated gaming hub supports Xbox Game Pass, Nvidia GeForce Now, and more, allowing you to cloud stream compatible games without the need to boot up your console. You simply need a controller, a stable internet connection, and a subscription to the relevant gaming service. This means you can play "Halo," "Fallout," and even "The Sims 4" on your Samsung TV, with the app recommending other games to consider checking out as well.

While Google TV's Android TV OS also offers cloud gaming through its support of Nvidia GeForce Now Cloud Gaming and Steam Link, these services are accessed through separate apps (with the likes of Amazon Luna requiring sideloading). You cannot access them all in one place as you can with Samsung's integrated gaming hub. While native support for Xbox Game Pass is coming to Google TV via an update in May 2026, it will initially only be rolled out to TCL TVs.

Samsung SmartThings is a smart home platform that lets you control or automate devices from your smart TV and other smart devices. The SmartThings app is built into Samsung Tizen smart TVs, allowing you to control supported devices like your lights, fridge, and thermostat, and even set automations like "turn all lights off at bedtime," directly from your TV. Of course, you need to ensure these devices are set up first for this to run seamlessly.

Not only does this platform support compatible Samsung devices and appliances, it supports select devices from third-party brands, including Philips, JBL, Bosch, and Google Nest. While Google TV offers smart home integration with Google Home, this only supports Google and Nest products. If you want to build a synchronized smart home setup with fewer brand restrictions, a Samsung Tizen smart TV will easily slide into that dynamic.

Google TV's focus on content discovery and personalization provides a more streamlined user experience, with its home screen organizing content by interest and pulling in recommendations from across all its supported apps. While useful, this can make the home screen and UI overly cluttered with recommendations, trending shows and films, and promotions — though Google has been testing a redesign that may make the home screen cleaner.

Samsung Tizen, on the other hand, offers a cleaner and more responsive UI, prioritizing major (and frequently used) apps and its live TV channels. The Tizen's centralized menu system makes it easy to flick between live TV, apps, and the Samsung Gaming Hub using your remote controller. You can also use the Bixby voice assistant to do this if you'd rather.

While this approach offers less personalization, Tizen does offer some recommendations for you without making the home screen too busy, making Samsung smart TVs more straightforward to navigate.

Tizen smart TVs come with a free ad-supported television service (FAST), called Samsung Plus TV, which is pre-installed on all Samsung smart TVs released after 2016. This allows users to watch over 4,300 free, live TV channels without a subscription — though the specific channels available to you will depend on the country or region you live in.

In addition, Samsung Plus TV offers access to a large library of on-demand TV shows and films — again, without a subscription needed. Right now, users can watch the likes of "John Wick," "Office Space," and "Kitchen Nightmares" for free.

While Google TV provides access to its own FAST service, this live TV feature is more limited than Samsung's offering, with hundreds of channels available rather than thousands. In addition, Google doesn't natively offer free films and TV shows on demand, but you can access third-party libraries through apps like Tubi and Plexi.