Movie trailers not working when searched via voice (Siri)

I'm having this same issue. From Siri results; I can play movie trailers on: iPhone, iPad, iPad Pro, and MacBook Pro. However I can't play movie trailers on either of my AppleTV 4K boxes. All of these devices are connected to the same home network, they can all play movie trailers except for my two AppleTV 4K's. Which means this appears to be unique to the AppleTV's tvOS.

To reiterate what OP @drewstg and @fredbonn said: On an AppleTV box, if you manually browse to a movie that's in the iTunes Movies app or the TV+ app the trailer will play, however if you search for the movie using text search or voice (Siri) which is by far the most commonly used way to find a movie you're looking for, then the trailer wont play and it just brings you back to the Home Screen of the TV+ app.

Things I've tried:

• Rebooting router & cable modem
• Resetting router to factory default
• Unplugging power from AppleTV boxes for 10mins, plugging back in
• AppleTV's connected via Wi-Fi
• AppleTV's connected via wired Ethernet
• Updating tvOS to latest version (14.4)
• Resetting AppleTV's to factory default
• Logging in to AppleTV with a different AppleID
• Changing DNS from CloudFlare (1.1.1.1) to OpenDNS (208.67.222.222)
• Changing DNS to Comcast (75.75.75.75)
• Adding AppleTV to DMZ of router

None of the above steps resolved the issue. Many other people are experiencing the same problem. How can we get the attention of someone at Apple to take a look at this since it appears to be a software issue? Are you able to help escalate this @Jeff_W ?

Hello drewstg,

Thanks for visiting Apple Support Communities. We understand that when searching for a movie using Siri, the preview doesn't play. Great steps with restarting and ensuring the software is updated. Is this happening when searching within a particular app, or iTunes Movies? If a third-party app, quit the app and relaunch it. Just in case, those steps can be found under "Force the highlighted app to quit" here: Switch quickly between Apple TV apps

If the issue continues, delete and reinstall the app. Those steps are found under "Delete or hide apps" here: Move and hide apps on your Apple TV

Keep us posted.

Take care.

I can confirm on all my Apple TV's it still has not been resolved after updating to 14.5 (18L204).

We're now up to 36 people all reporting the same issue.

@Jeff_W can you get a hold of anyone at Apple to get some attention on this? Clearly a bug in the software and nothing we users can do to fix.

Same issue. I did a full reset and I still can’t play trailers — any movie trailer we select goes to the Apple TV+ Screen.

the service reps advice isn’t helpful — this is an issue with the core system; not any specific app.

Same issue here. Glad it isn’t just my device. Hoping for a software fix soon. tvOS 14.5 did not fix the issue for me.

For Apple reps looking to reproduce the issue:

1. Use the Apple TV remote to activate Siri and have it search for a movie. Try “Show me Iron Man”
2. Click on the movie when it pops up in the Siri search results tab at the bottom of the screen
3. Now in that movie’s “page” scroll down to Trailer and try to play it.
4. Bug: you are sent to the Apple TV app with no trace of the movie whose trailer you wanted to play.

The problem doesn’t occur if you access the movies “page” by searching for the movie in the Movies app.

This has been happening to me too with my ATV HD. So I upgraded today to the brand new 4K. Exact same results.

As a way outside the box idea, I signed myself out. I tried the search movie by Siri -> click trailer. And IT WORKS! I don’t know why and it’s not really a solution as I want access to my account.

I have a support case open since March where I have filmed the issue with support on the phone and they have took logs from my ATV HD.

I’ll update if I find a solution.

Anybody else wants to sign out and see if they can watch trailers?

tvOS 14.6 resolved this…FINALLY! I have original 4K Apple TV.

jeg3141 wrote:

I have the same issue. I own three Apple TV 4Ks and on all of themwhen I use Siri voice search to find a movie and then move down to the Trailers section, if I select the trailer it doesn’t play it, it just sends me to Up Next.

Did you update to tvOS 14.6 and see if it is still an issue?

Callysto wrote:

I’m amazed and interested how you got a hold of support that took your logs and a video. When I run into issues like this I’d love to get a hold of someone at Apple to provide them with logs and examples… how did you open your support ticket? All I’ve ever found is these forums.

I've also checked on reddit and found another handful of people who had the same issue.

I just went on the apple support website and found a phone number. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201232

I think I called that main US number. After they get through the basics (unplug, reproduce the issue) and the advanced steps (reset, restore from a Mac) and the issue persisted, they pulled my analytics from the ATV. I think it's Play + Volume Down for about 6 seconds, it runs some logs and then you can AirDrop that to any other Apple device and then Apple sent me a link to upload it to for their engineers to look at.

I had another issue that my ATV was able to turn my TV off when I turned the ATV off but could not turn the TV on when I turned the ATV on. Some guy messaged me on reddit yesterday to unplug the TV for 30 seconds. Fixed my problem of like 1.5 years (I had to use two remotes, which is a fairly minor inconvenience).

Thanks for the testing. I tried signing out of all Apple services except for Home Kit (signed out of iTunes Store, iCloud, GameCenter), rebooted, and trailers still didn’t work for me. I have a feeling I was still somehow signed in enough. If I did a factory reset maybe I would have had the same results as you.

I’m amazed and interested how you got a hold of support that took your logs and a video. When I run into issues like this I’d love to get a hold of someone at Apple to provide them with logs and examples… how did you open your support ticket? All I’ve ever found is these forums.

I have the same issue. I own three Apple TV 4Ks and on all of themwhen I use Siri voice search to find a movie and then move down to the Trailers section, if I select the trailer it doesn’t play it, it just sends me to Up Next.

I’m having this problem too. Any fix?

Me too.

Same issue. If I search for a movie with Siri (or text search) and try to view the trailer, it just comes back to then Home Screen of TV+

very frustrating

TVos 14.5 doesn’t even fix this. Ugh! I should have gotten a Roku!