Sky UK TV Update Adds New Voice Features to Sky Q Boxes
Sky (Sky Broadband) has today announced that they’ve begun to roll-out a new firmware update for their Sky Q TV boxes and service, which adds a bunch of new voice features (e.g. Voice Guidance). On top of that their Sky Go app has gained new ‘Continue Watching‘, ‘Sky Channels‘ and ‘Browse by Category‘ rails to make it easier to use.
The main additions to Sky Q this time around include some further improvements to its Voice Control feature, which means that Disney+ content will now appear in voice and text searches, making it even easier to navigate and search.
On top of that they’ve also added Voice Guidance, which gives customers spoken descriptions of the menu you’re currently navigating, as well as a description of the option you’re hovering over or have selected, and instructions for how you can easily get to your favourite shows or movies.
Fraser Stirling, Sky’s Group Chief Product Officer, said:
“Today marks another big moment for Sky Q as we roll out exciting new voice features. Integrating Disney+ into voice search means it’s now much easier to find more of what you love and adding voice guidance to our strong accessibility offering helps to create an even better experience for all Sky Q customers.”
The new features are starting to roll-out today and the phased update process is due to complete for all customers by the “end of April 2021“. Customers can activate Voice Guidance by saying “Voice Guidance on” or “Voice Guidance Off” into their Sky Q voice remote.
Mark is a professional technology writer, IT consultant and computer engineer from Dorset (England), he also founded ISPreview in 1999 and enjoys analysing the latest telecoms and broadband developments. Find me on X (Twitter), Mastodon, Facebook and Linkedin.
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Still though some users are plagued by the audio issues.
I’m still getting intermittent sound and vision problems?
I thought I was going mad as when watching recorded or streamed content the sound regularly drops out for half a second or so. Doesn’t happen on live TV for some reason.
My Q box loves to let the audio go out of sync with the TV. Tried everything. New cables, different tv and nada. It doesn’t pass through anything so its obviously the box at fault.
@Bubbles
My old sky HD box used 2 do that with my plasma TV sometimes. Like the sound track was being decoded slower by the box or something.
Been reading about the sky q sound problem and it goes back q good few years and no word of a fix.
I even bought a new amp thinking it was the amp problem but it did the same when watching recordings or streaming something my sound drops out for a few seconds very annoying
Who uses sky Q nowadays everything I watch is through Amazon fire stick bbc iplayer, YouTube etc..
Probably their few million customers. That might not be you, but be aware your real-world experience may differ from other people’s.
Sky Q is awesome, Amazon stick might suit some people. But for my family Sky Q content with mini boxes in each room is the best setup for us.
Sky Q does the trick here, 1 main box with 3 mini’s (shame that only 2 mini’s can be used concurrently)
All it’s missing for us is user profiles to separate the recordings
@zakir – Those of that get deals with Netflix 4K, disney+, discovery+, Sky Ondemand UHD, Sky Cineme UHD along with a load of other channels and multiroom viewing for much less than taking subscriptions alone.
Just to add, I get £51.95 worth of services and UHD and extra content, hardware and all on a managed service for £29.00… and thus far a customer service department that have been useful, reliable and going the extra mile to sort the smallest of issues.
Thats why Sky’s TV service still rocks on.
“Who uses Amazon fire stick bbc iplayer, YouTube etc… nowadays everything I watch is through torrent/popcorntime etc..”
Said a pirate somewhere, probably… arrr
Still adding new features instead of fixing the issues present from day one. I don’t use voice control and haven’t got Disney, I do have lip sync issues (need advance – only got delay) and occasional box lock-ups. And what has Sqy Q got to do with ISP news? Shell are an ISP but we don’t get petrol price news on here.
I had really bad lip sync issues on Sky Q, especially with UHD. If you have the option, try using optical for audio rather than HDMI – completely fixed the issue for me.
I expect most visitors to a website of this type are more interested in Sky Q’s features than they are petrol prices. Besides, you’re not the owner of this website. He gets to decide what to post; not you.
If you don’t like the news use another site. Mark has been doing a great job for years.
Is everybody having a strop today? 😀
There is an offsync setting on the box else check your TV as mine has settings for it.
I found the delay to audio occurs when output is set to Dolby Digital and a non-surround program is broadcast. Seems to be a “feature”, so I switch the sound output back to Normal when this happens.
The fix I found for the lip sync issues was as follows…
So my setup is a Samsung Q90R TV paired with a Samsung Q80 Soundbar (Dolby Atmos).
I found that if I have the SkyQ box plugged directly into an HDMI on the TV and then the audio being routed via the ARC HDMI to the soundbar (as you’d expect to use this setup) that it gave me awful syncing problems.
I now plug the SkyQ box HDMI direct to one of the 2 HDMI inputs I have on the soundbar and then pass this through to the TV via the soundbars ARC HDMI link. No more lip sync issues, works perfectly and because I’m still using HDMI I get the benefit of Dolby Atmos (beaware, although using optical or toslink cable will resolve this as well, you won’t have Dolby Atmos support).
Hope this helps!
Sky Q needs to add the reminder feature that was on the Sky HD boxes. We’ve just upgraded to Sky Q and are finding it pretty frustrating that the feature isn’t there.
Feel the same – Really missing the reminder feature… Don’t understand why they removed something that is such a massive help when watching telly… Yeah,the recording/ watching back is maybe great, but the reminder help in real time watching… You can’t beat that..
I’m still disappointed that my Sky A box hasn’t got HDR,why didn’t sky put this on all the sky Q boxes from the start.
Yo jp well said he q cheap skate and we have a happy family not a argument
So glad I ditched Sky.
Amazon firestick 4k offers much more and I can get rid of that awful dish!
Ispreview is brilliant and Mark is worth his weight in gold.
Sky want to sort there audio drop out in sound while watching recorded stuff than concentrating on new features
Getting very irritated about Sky Q always starting on the menu page.
What’s wrong with starting on the last channel used, like a normal tv?
Also, bring back the reminder page for programmes.
Fed up finding I’ve missed episodes of a new series for a programme.
Because it’s not a TV, it’s a digibox that you plug into your TV? And it does start on the latest channel used, just PiP. Pres back to exit – it’s a single button press.
Just gone to sky q. Is wifi dropping out normal it’s so frustrating
I had to have my wired coz WiFi drops out to much
Sky Q, no reminder a backward step, having to go to home before channels and I’m sure the picture quality in HD is not as good as my old Sky HD+ box. The remote is poorly laid out and with black buttons on a black background, near impossible to see at night. You have to wonder who is in charge of the technical department.
Totally agree. PITA. Badly thought out.
Worst decision ever having one planner. SKY + was much better.
Two tv’s in a house watched in two different rooms vital to have separate planners.
Agree with a lot of the negative comments here. As much as Sky have progressed, they’ve also neglected a lot of problems. No TV guide button. No reminder button. Taken away the slow-mo feature. Touch remote is horrific. Can’t arrange tabs to your liking. Sound drops on the new Sky Q box. Price hikes and plenty of issues.
Very poor response to request for an upgrade. No consideration for long established subscribers. Extremely disappointed
Skyq is brilliant its just the cost and 18 month contract that I find irksome.
I am on my second Sky q box. This one I gave a sound problem on recordings,the sound drops off and misses words! Rang them up..no help offered.
How customer service varies from customer to customer amazes me, I wonder if its more a compatibility matching issue.
Why are pictures so dark i cant watch some films picture are poor gritty you have put prices up but poor quality thinking of closing sky i am paying you £158 pound a month what for not happy customer
There is nothing wrong with picture quality. Check the settings on your TV.
You absolutely should not be paying £158 per month. Call up saying you want to cancel and renegotiate your contract.