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Why does my Fire TV Stick keep returning to the Home screen or sleeping?
Why does my Fire TV Stick keep returning to the Home screen or sleeping?

Toggle the "Still Watching" preference to OFF.

Andrew Sipes avatar
Written by Andrew Sipes
Updated over a year ago

Are you launching VMcast on your Fire TV Stick only to find it on the Amazon Home screen or your TV screen black (sleeping) a few hours later? Have you gotten a pop up message asking "Are you still watching?"

Don't worry! This has nothing to do with your VMcast app or subscription. This is caused by an Amazon device setting.

How to fix it

  1. Using your Fire TV's remote, navigate to device Settings (⚙).

  2. Select "Preferences."

  3. Select "Data Usage Monitoring" and look for the "Still Watching" option.

  4. Turn this preference "OFF."

Why is this happening?

Amazon released an update to FireOS that included a new preference called "Still Watching" that aims to conserve user data when a Fire TV device is not in use. When this setting is ON, you will be prompted to confirm you're still watching after 4 hours of not using the remote to navigate.

There is a known issue for the Amazon Fire TV Stick 4k Max where sleep mode disrupts the VMcast playback. There are no solutions from Amazon at this time to disable this setting.

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