Roku just added a home screen feature you’ll actually want to use

If you own a Roku device, such as a Roku TV or streaming stick, you’re probably used to Roku occasionally tweaking the look of the home screen, sometimes for the better and sometimes for the worse. Keeping that tradition alive, Roku has once again added something new to the home screen with its latest update, and for anyone subscribed to services like Netflix or HBO Max, it could prove to be pretty useful.

The new addition in the spotlight here is a dedicated Subscriptions tab on the home screen. As the name suggests, it pulls together content from the streaming services you’re subscribed to and logged into on your Roku, making it easier to jump back into whatever you were watching (via Cord Cutter News).

When you hover over the Subscriptions tab, you’ll see a few different sections pop up. There’s “Popular From Your Subscriptions,” which highlights trending content, “Continue Watching (Subscriptions),” which lets you pick up right where you left off, and “Newly Added to Your Subscriptions,” which surfaces recently added shows and movies.

Overall, if you subscribe to multiple streaming services and watch them on your Roku, this new tab should make it a lot easier to keep track of them all in one place. That said, Roku’s home screen is already packed with options like Live TV, Sports, Featured Free, and What to Watch, so the Subscriptions tab does add yet another item to an already crowded menu, but that can be fixed.

How to edit your Roku home screen

You can adjust it to match your viewing habits

If you want to tidy up your Roku home screen and reduce the number of tabs, the good news is that Roku makes it easy to do so. Whether you want to keep the new Subscriptions tab, get rid of it, or tweak any of the other menu items, you can change them all.

To do this, press the Home button on your Roku remote to open the home screen, then go to Settings > Home screen. From there, you’ll see a list of all the menu items that can appear on your home screen, along with the option to show or hide each one.

If there’s something you’d rather not see — like the new Subscriptions tab, Live TV, Weekly Trivia, Sports, or Featured Free — you can hide it here and instantly make your home screen feel a lot less cluttered.

Personally, I’m a fan of the new Subscriptions tab on the Roku home screen because most of the content I watch comes from streaming services like Netflix, HBO Max, and Prime Video, not The Roku Channel itself. On the flip side, if most of the content you watch on your Roku is free from Roku itself, it likely won’t be as useful to you, though at least you can turn it off.