There is no shortage of streaming sticks and devices on the market today, but perhaps the leader of the game, Roku, has been the same since it first debuted more than five years ago.
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You may ask later, one new Roku stick even needed? If there aren’t many changes – and since it’s almost impossible to buy a TV these days that isn’t a smart TV with built-in apps – what’s the point?
the Roku Streaming Stick 4K answers the questions and proves that yes, it has a place in today’s streaming world.
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Roku Streaming Stick 4K
The Roku 4K streaming stick hides behind your TV and brings any non-Roku television into the user-friendly streaming world of Roku.
Everything about Roku’s latest stick felt instantly familiar when I unboxed it. Included is a streaming stick, a micro-USB power cable with a long-range Wi-Fi receiver, a USB power brick, and the traditional Roku remote, this time with Netflix, Disney+, Apple TV+, and Paramount+ shortcuts at the bottom.
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The overall design of the stick is simple and unobtrusive, but that’s what you want because it’s designed to be placed behind your television and never be seen again. It’s a small rectangle a few inches long that plugs into your TV’s HDMI input and into a power outlet to bring that television into the Roku ecosystem.
You can plug the stick directly into your TV’s USB power, but that means the stick will reboot every time the TV is turned off and on, whereas plugging through a power outlet always ready to stick.
One of the biggest advantages of Roku’s streaming ecosystem is that it’s easy to set up and use, making it a great choice for beginners. The interface is the easiest to use of all the options in my opinion, and it is the same even if you use an external stick or if it comes with the TV.
I timed the whole process; from unboxing to pairing the remote to downloading and installing the update to logging into Netflix was exactly eight and a half minutes. And including the time it took to change the streaming stick to another HDMI input when the device knew I wasn’t getting the best quality (I plugged it into a port that doesn’t support HDMI 2.0) and suggested that I change.
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The setup process guides you through choosing the streaming apps you want on your home screen, but others can be added or removed (or even moved) at any time. Apps can be added from your computer when you are logged into your account.
Once I had everything ready, I headed straight to trying the biggest upgrade on Roku Streaming Stick 4K have something to offer. Although it is mostly the same as the previous Roku streaming stick, it brings one important improvement – support for Dolby Vision (which essentially makes dark colors darker and bright colors brighter, the difference increases).
I don’t have an old Roku stick to compare it to, but I immediately noticed that things were pretty much the same on my main TV. And that is a good thing. The picture on the screen through the Roku streaming stick is very similar to the picture from the television itself in Dolby Vision 4K.
While I couldn’t do a tabi-tabi, I did a little testing myself. I had my wife queue up for the same part of the show as I left the room, not knowing whether or not she had switched to the main TV. When I came back, I couldn’t tell if he had turned the TV back to the native streaming app built-in or if it was still on the Roku stick (Spoiler: it’s still the Roku).
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The stick also supports HDR10/10+, streams at 60 FPS, and upscale content from 720p and 1080p, meaning old content will take on new life. When I pulled up an episode of an old sitcom to try upscaling, it was just like the more expensive, more expensive televisions with the same technology built in.
Navigation is fast, and menus load very quickly — faster than actual Roku TVs elsewhere in my house.
ZDNET’s buying advice
The latest Roku stick has a $50 price tag, putting it right in line with the latest Amazon Fire Stick and Google Chromecast. And since Roku’s system is easier to navigate than others, I think there is a clear winner.
It is worth noting that there is a Roku Streaming Stick 4K+ available for about $20 more, and from everything I’ve found, the actual streaming stick is about the same between the two. The extra version just got a better remote, the Voice Remote Pro. The Pro remote adds a hands-free button that lets you turn voice commands on and off, a headphone jack, and two programmable shortcut buttons that let you choose a channel of your own. Perhaps the biggest upgrade is that it has a rechargeable battery that you can plug into a wall outlet.
Whether that upgrade is worth the extra price or not depends on your situation, but I can confirm the base model of Roku 4K Streaming Stick it’s definitely worth the investment if you have a TV you want to bring into the Roku ecosystem.
