NowTV on web browser - terrible UI
@RealXT wrote:Hi
Im a little hard of sight. Thats where im coming from.
The user interface for now tv on a pc is very very frustrating. To select and play the live tv channell is way harder than it needs to be. The little bar that allows you to scroll is so small it takes me 3 or 4 attempts to 'grab' it. When on a channell i cannot switch, you need to go back, then find the little bar and try to scroll to a new channell.
There is no favourites to put my own favs together at the top. I'd love an epg that you can click on to play the programme i want to watch. id live to be able to change channell easier and make that 'bar' 3 times the size it currently is. If you look at thinks like pluto tv or plex you see a lot of these features implemented.
I tried live chat, and the agents advice was the UI is better if i use a different device than web browser. EG Xbox or google TV etc. This isnt bad advice but fails to address the web UI and how it can be better.
Here are some things you can try on your PC that may improve your NOW experience without having to switch to Xbox, Google TV or other devices.
First of all, did you try enlarging the zoom in the browser? In Chrome, Edge and Firefox, you can press CTRL and the + (plus) key to zoom in and CTRL and 0 (zero) to go back to default. It may be helpful in seeing the channel list and some of the controls better. You may try 125%, 150% or even 175%.
You can also enlarge the interface in Windows itself. In Settings > System > Display > Scale, you can increase the scale to 125% or 150%, making everything in the interface larger in Windows rather than just the NOW website.
Keyboard navigation is something worth trying out. When you are on the NOW website, you can use Tab and Shift+Tab to navigate between selectable objects without positioning the mouse over a very small control. Enter or Space will generally activate the currently selected object on a website with good keyboard navigation support. It should help with having to "grab" that tiny scroll bar frequently.
However, if it is the scrollbar that is causing the issue, there are accessibility settings in Windows which will keep the scrollbars visible even when they are not in use. Go to Windows Settings, and find the option "Always show scrollbars". In addition, using a mouse wheel, the two-finger scrolling gesture on your laptop's touchpad, or PAGE UP/PAGE DOWN (labelled PG UP/PG DN) may help you scroll through the list of channels without using the scrollbar directly.
Unluckily, all of these are workarounds, and there is nothing you can do about some of the issues you listed. If NOW does not provide the options such as Favorites, a traditional clickable EPG, or channel up/down buttons in its web player, then there is no setting you could turn on that would bring these features.
I would definitely differentiate this from the advice that was given to you during the Live Chat session. Although it is true that watching TV on an Xbox or Google TV will definitely make the interface more user-friendly, watching the content on your PC should not be that difficult.
If none of those help, I'd contact NOW again and specifically describe it as an accessibility issue due to visual impairment, rather than simply feedback about the layout. That should make it clearer that you're looking for accessibility assistance with the web player rather than a recommendation for another streaming device.
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