Families are about to be a lot happier with Sling TV. At the tail end of an interview with Tom's Guide, Sling TV Executive Vice President & Group President Gary Schanman just broke some news on a previously-announced feature that is now rolling out to Sling users.
Editor's note: This story has been updated with more details on Sling's multi-user features.
When asked about the best recently-launched features on Sling, Schanman referenced the sports scores feature that rolled out in this past summer and users profiles. Schanman noted that this feature is currently in a soft-launch state, as Sling has yet to promote it. So, if you don't have it now, expect it in the near future. Currently, it's going out to Amazon and Android TV devices.
One of my favorite new features involves the Favorites section of your TV guide. With multiple user profiles, each user's list of favorites — which basically create a custom TV guide — won't be mixed in with the whole group's.
Previously, in announcing Sling TV's price increase, Schanman had listed "new User Profiles for your household" as a feature coming in the future, but only today has he confirmed the feature is going out to users.
Sling TV users will get a total of five user profiles that can be "labeled and color coded" for easy identification. Each profile will get "More relevant personalized content featured on the Home Screen," their own DVR section, profile-specific continue watching options and the ability to view only your recently made searches.
Outlook: Sling catches up to the field — and looks to improve
Sling's multiple user support is a bit overdue, as YouTube TV, Hulu with Live TV, fuboTV and Philo all have this feature. That said, those competitors — Philo has 10 users, while YouTube, Hulu and Fubo have six — all give you more profiles.
This feature will hopefully help keep others from erasing things in your DVR queue, though we can envision a situation where one family member is hogging all the DVR space.
Schanman also told Tom's Guide that Sling has plans over the "next two quarters to innovate to improve loyalty and engagement," with changes that will "increase customer satisfaction and improving the user experience." That might just sound like corporate-speak to some, but with the incoming addition of user profiles, it's clear that Sling is not standing still.
