iHeartRadio TV Apps
Lead Android engineering for a rebuilt iHeartRadio experience across Android TV, Amazon Fire TV, and connected living-room platforms — through a TribalScale client engagement.
Overview
iHeartRadio is one of the largest audio platforms in the United States — live radio, podcasts, playlists, and personalized stations across hundreds of platforms and thousands of connected devices. The connected-TV apps had to translate that experience into a remote-first, 10-foot interface that worked the moment a user sat down on the couch.
Through TribalScale, I served as lead developer for the rebuild of the iHeartRadio Android TV and Amazon Fire TV applications — Kotlin codebase, Leanback-driven TV UX, and ExoPlayer-backed streaming audio — and provided technical consulting for the related iHeartRadio Android Auto and iOS CarPlay efforts that anchored the company’s broader “listen anywhere” strategy.
What sets it apart
Rebuilt for the 10-foot experience
The Android TV and Fire TV apps were rebuilt around D-pad navigation, focus management, and large station artwork — Leanback-style browsing tuned for the way users actually interact with iHeartRadio across the room, not a scaled-up phone interface.
Reliable live radio and custom stations
Core listening behaviors — live radio, custom stations, favorites, and station artwork — sit on top of an ExoPlayer-based playback layer, with media controls and playback state tuned for a remote-driven TV experience.
Kotlin rebuild, TDD, pair programming
A Kotlin codebase built with test-driven development and pair programming, against the platform realities of Android TV, Amazon Fire TV, and Facebook Portal TV — modernization that traded a legacy app for a maintainable foundation iHeartRadio could keep evolving.
My role
As Lead Engineer at TribalScale on the iHeartRadio engagement, I led the Android TV and Amazon Fire TV rebuild end to end — collaborating with iHeartRadio product, design, and stakeholder teams to translate the company’s mobile listening experience into a Kotlin-based connected-TV app, with Leanback-driven UX and ExoPlayer-backed playback. I also served as a technical consultant for the iHeartRadio Android Auto and iOS CarPlay efforts that bracketed the TV work.
- Led the rebuild of the iHeartRadio Android TV and Amazon Fire TV applications in Kotlin
- Designed the 10-foot UX — Leanback-style browsing, focus management, D-pad navigation, station artwork
- Implemented ExoPlayer-backed streaming audio for live radio, custom stations, and favorites
- Supported Facebook Portal TV alongside Android TV and Fire TV from a shared connected-TV codebase
- Drove engineering quality through test-driven development, pair programming, and agile delivery
- Collaborated with product, design, stakeholders, and client engineering teams during a high-visibility consulting engagement
- Provided technical consulting for the iHeartRadio Android Auto and iOS CarPlay integrations
Capabilities
- Live radio streaming
- Custom & artist stations
- Favorites & saved stations
- Connected-TV UX
- Browse & discover
- Podcasts & shows
- Account activation flow
- Cross-device account linking
- Station metadata & artwork
- Remote-first navigation
- Playback state handling
- Living-room media controls
Distributed across
Built on
- Languages
- KotlinJava
- TV UI
- AndroidX LeanbackAndroid TVFire TVFocus managementD-pad navigation
- Playback
- ExoPlayerMediaSessionAudio focusStreaming audio
- Architecture
- Clean architectureView modelsRepository pattern
- Delivery
- Test-driven developmentPair programmingAgile / XPContinuous delivery
- Adjacent consulting
- Android AutoiOS CarPlay
- Platforms
- Android TVAmazon Fire TVFacebook Portal TV
Further reading
Public sources framing iHeartRadio’s scale, the connected-TV product surface, and the cross-platform strategy this engagement supported.
- iHeartMedia · Digital — iHeartRadio scale and platform reachiHeartMedia, currentCurrent iHeartMedia overview citing 188M+ registered users, 3,500+ live stations, 500+ platforms, and 2,000+ connected devices.
- iHeartRadio for Google TVGoogle Play, currentCurrent Google TV / Android TV listing for the iHeartRadio TV application — the surface this engagement rebuilt.
- iHeartRadio TV on Amazon Fire TVAmazon, currentCurrent Fire TV listing for iHeartRadio — the second connected-TV surface in scope.
- Adding iHeartRadio to Android TViHeartRadio HelpiHeartRadio support article documenting the TV activation flow — a window into the account-linking UX the rebuild had to fit.
- iHeartMedia launches redesigned iHeartRadio Family App and announces Honda integrationsiHeartMedia, CES 2019CES 2019 announcement covering iHeartRadio integrations across Android TV, Android Auto, Roku, and Samsung — the cross-platform context surrounding the TV rebuild.
- Support for Meta Portal devicesMeta Help CenterMeta’s notice that Portal devices are no longer sold (since Dec 2022) — context for treating Portal TV as a historical platform in this case study.
“Listen anywhere — the iHeartRadio living-room experience, rebuilt for Android TV and Fire TV.”
Lead Engineer · TribalScale · iHeartRadio
Nov 2018 – Aug 2019
This case study covers the iHeartRadio TV product engagement, delivered through TribalScale. The full role detail — other clients, scope, and consulting context — lives on the experience page.
Read the role detail