prob already known, but reporting the 9.1.36 preview build fixed the ‘view-refresh’ issue in all my collections - looking forward to those changes being posted in production as well. Thanks!
The Plex Roku app currently suffers from significant usability and interaction design issues. The interface is not intuitive and introduces unnecessary cognitive load by forcing users to relearn navigation patterns that previously worked well, without delivering meaningful improvements.
Common user flows, such as navigating from Home to a library or switching between library view require too many button clicks. This increases navigation errors and is not usability friendly like efficiency of use and minimal interaction with the remote.
While I understand consistency across platforms may be Plex’s goal, using this architecture would be a mistake. Although the UI is overdue for modernization, the current Roku plex anpp architecture and navigation model feel like a step backwards rather than an improvement.
Top-level menus are acceptable, but the app fails to persist user state. The interface should remember the user’s last selection within a library (e.g., Browse or Playlists) instead of forcing repeated re-selection. Persisting navigation context would significantly reduce unnecessary clicks and improve overall usability.
No issues here.
I’m used to the new UI (I had a head start as I was using the Preview App before it went ‘live’)
I still say libraries on the left is the most intuitive location, they could have moved everything else to the top and turned the left library menu into an off screen slide out style.
You mean like it originally was (for the most part) lol
I’ll jump in. Its been almost 6 months now and I’m most definitely not used to the new layout. Aside from it now being difficult to find my libraries, there are 2 core usability complaints that drive me nuts.
- Switching libraries is an atrocious wreck. Honestly, the fact that the library menu auto opens makes things 10x worse. I navigate to the library at the top, and since it is a “button” I click “OK” and before I realize it I’m on the library’s recommended page, which is almost never where I want to be. I then have to scroll back up, over again to the library, fight my urge to click “OK” while I wait for the menu to load, then move over, then move down (because someone thought it was a good idea to make the recommended page be the first option) to the library. Its not just a couple of clicks, its a lot of clicks, with an unintuitive pause thrown in there for good measure.
- Getting back to the libraries after scrolling content is a disaster. When I’m down in the M’s or even worse, the S’s on my movie library, the its just not feasible to get back to the menu that is at the top. Its actually easier to close the Plex app, reopen it, and type in the pin again than it is to scroll all the way back up. Especially when our Roku remote is missing and I have to use my phone.
There you go. Two concrete examples of how the new Roku experience has made the Plex app worse you can share with your bosses, and they can ignore.
You can configure what the default is between Recommended and Browse in Settings → Experience → Default Library View.
Just press the back button.
But you can’t choose what view to display per library, which is still a downgrade to what we used to have. And the selection process is awkward as hell still, compared to what we used to have.
I stumbled across a feature coming to the Chrome browser, “Vertical tabs”.
How ironic is it, that Plex gets rid of vetical menus and then a major browser introduces vertical tabs – playing with vertical tabs, I realize how mush more real estate I have for viewing windows.
Oh No! How will I manage!! I want my Chrome browser Horizontal Tabs back or I’m switching to FireFox!!!
Except what’s cool is that Chrome gives you either option. 
I think we know to press the Back button. The issue is how many times it needs to be pressed. If you’re deep into a library/collection/series/season of a show, you have to back out several levels to get access to navigation.
Yes, I agree that scenario needs to be improved but the question I was answering was specifically where pressing back would achieve the result they were asking for.
you know what the issue with pressing back on roku has become for me. I have a TV and also replaced a remote for my ultra with one of the new rechargeable remotes. they both have this behavior where you have to press buttons multiple times to get it to work. not sure if it’s a battery saver/ wake thing or what the deal is…but you click back and because you’re also trying to get the roku to respond you get too many clicks or not enough and you just wind up all over the place. However, the nav arrow buttons don’t seem to suffer from this.
I’ve said it a many times before and I’m going to say it again because it’s worth repeating… even though I’m sure Plex is tired of hearing it. As far as menu placement and navigating libraries concern the UI change has NOT been an improvement,
You wouldn’t need to improve anything if you wouldn’t have broken the whole navigation in the first place.
Just return to the perfectly fine side navigation bar.
I’m used to the top menu now, so no.
So what progress is being made toward a solution? Navigation should be accessible from any screen. Anything less is no longer user friendly. This is the biggest complaint I see about the new experience, so I would think that should be the first issue to get priority attention. If the assumption is that people will just get used to it, that’s pretty unlikely. It hasn’t even been rolled out on the other platforms yet.
The new UI is beyond terrible. The left hand vertical panel was 1000% easier to use and navigate.
I’m with (mostly) everyone else here. We want the left navigation menu back.
It’s ridiculous enough that you taunt us with a left navigation menu in the forums.
Been over a year, still just as horrible - your Roku interface is painful to use every single time.
Maybe I’m a minority user but your previous UX was orders of magnitude more navigable. I would be actively looking for other solutions if it wasn’t such a PITA to switch and still low-key am.
