TCL Android TV Remote

Review by eFreeware

If your TCL television's remote has gone missing behind the couch or the buttons have worn through, this app is aimed at you. TCL Android TV Remote, published by Naba, turns an Android phone into a control for TCL sets, covering Android TV models as well as Roku and older infrared televisions. It has been installed more than 500,000 times and holds a 4.6 average from 41,933 ratings, which suggests a fair number of people have found it useful enough to keep.

The pitch is straightforward: a phone you already carry becomes the remote, so dead batteries and cracked plastic casings stop being a problem. The app is free and supported by ads, and there are no in-app purchases to consider. It is not an official TCL product, and the developer is clear that it has no affiliation with TCL Electronics.

What you get is a replacement control rather than a companion screen or a streaming hub. Power, volume, channel and mute sit alongside navigation, home, multimedia keys and a touch pad. For anyone whose main television is a TCL, that covers the everyday jobs without hunting for a lost handset.

Everyday control for a TCL Android TV

The core use case is simple: your phone is on the couch, the remote is not, and you want to change the channel. Because the app works with the television over your home network, the buttons you press on the phone reach the set. Volume, channel, mute, power and navigation are all part of the package, so the routine adjustments people make dozens of times a day are covered.

The touch pad and navigation controls matter more than they might first appear. On an Android TV interface you spend a lot of time moving around menus, typing into search fields and picking shows, and a directional pad plus a touch surface is what makes that bearable from a phone. Multimedia keys round it out for playback, so pausing and skipping do not require a separate device.

I would expect this to be most useful in a household where the television is a TCL and the physical remote is shared, misplaced or failing. Keeping a second control on a phone that is usually within reach is a sensible backup, and it costs nothing to try.

Roku sets and older infrared televisions

Not every TCL television runs Android TV, and the app accounts for that. It supports TCL Roku televisions as well as sets that use a traditional infrared remote. The developer describes it as working across Android TV, Roku and conventional IR devices, which widens the pool of households it can serve.

The infrared side comes with a hardware condition. For those older televisions, the phone itself has to have an IR blaster built in. That is a feature many current phones have dropped, so it is worth checking your handset before assuming this route will work. Where the hardware is present, the developer says the app covers the same functions as the original remote.

Android TV models do not need that hardware, since they are controlled across the network instead. The app also supports Android Chromecast OS, according to the developer, so a television running that platform is another candidate. Between the network-controlled sets and the infrared ones, the app is trying to be a single answer for a range of TCL hardware rather than one narrow model.

What setup involves

Getting started on a network-connected television depends on both devices sharing the same Wi-Fi network. Once the app detects the TCL set, you enter the PIN that appears on the television screen, and from there the app is ready to use. That pairing step is part of getting the phone talking to the right television in the house.

The same-network requirement is the part I would flag before installing. If the phone is on a different network segment from the television, the app has nothing to talk to. In a normal home setup where both sit on one router, that is not a hurdle; it is simply the condition the app works under.

For infrared televisions the sequence is different, because there is no network pairing involved. What matters there is the phone's IR blaster, as covered above. The developer invites users who cannot get a connection to write to [email protected], which is a reasonable fallback if the pairing step does not go smoothly.

Fits a TCL household, not a universal one

This app is built around TCL televisions. Android TV, Roku and infrared TCL sets are the targets, and the feature set reads as a faithful reproduction of a television remote rather than a media browser or a program guide. If your living room television is a TCL, the match is direct; the app concentrates on that brand.

The strongest candidates are people who have already lost or broken a remote, or who want a second control without buying hardware. Someone with an Android TV TCL set gets the smoothest experience, since the network route avoids the IR blaster question entirely. Owners of older TCL sets should check their phone's hardware first.

It has been updated as recently as August 30, 2025, with the developer noting that an out-of-memory issue was resolved and the heap size increased. That is a maintenance signal rather than a feature, but it suggests the app is being looked after.

A spare remote for TCL owners

TCL Android TV Remote does one job and does it for a defined group of televisions. If you own a TCL Android TV, Roku TV or an older infrared TCL set, and you want your phone to stand in for the remote, this is a free way to get there. The 4.6 average across more than 41,000 ratings points to a base of users who have stuck with it.

The conditions are worth weighing. Your phone and television need to be on the same Wi-Fi network for network control, and infrared televisions need a phone with an IR blaster. None of that is unusual for a free utility, but it shapes who will get the most from it.

For a TCL household with a missing or failing remote, this is a practical stopgap that costs nothing to install and keeps a working control within arm's reach. For anyone whose television is another brand, the app's TCL focus means it is not the tool for the job.

What's new in version 20.0

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