Developer Console

HTML5 Hybrid Apps (Fire TV)

HTML5 hybrid apps are platform-native apps that can present web content as part of the client application. Developing your app as a hybrid app allows you to provide capabilities that are not possible in a web app, due to the security boundary between the browser and the device APIs.

Amazon WebView (AWV)

You develop your hybrid app using the API and capabilities of the standard Android WebView class. For additional information, refer to the Android documentation for WebView

WebView provides the following benefits for hybrid app development:

  • Support for latest web standards (HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript)
  • Hardware acceleration and GPU optimizations for CSS, Canvas, and WebGL graphics
  • Support for Web Developer Tools for on-device debugging and profiling

In Fire OS 5 and later releases, AWV is a transparent replacement for the standard Android WebView class. AWV is supported for Amazon FireTV and 3rd generation and later Fire tablets.

AWV uses a custom build of Chromium that has been hardware-optimized and GPU-accelerated specifically for Fire OS devices. Amazon WebView provides the following additional benefits:

  • Better video performance on TV devices (fluidity, power, memory, audio/video sync)
  • Faster, more efficient rendering, script performance, and memory management
  • Page rendering, layout, and painting improvements

Last updated: Oct 29, 2020