Apple TV 4K 2021 shows only HD video from all apps instead of 4K or UHD

It’s a picture taken of Netflix with the developer HUD turned on the shows the stream details. You use Xcode to enable it on the ATV. If you are on the latest software build for the ATV, the issue is resolved.

Very odd, either you got a faulty Apple TV or you have a bad HDMI cable or something. I have seen the new Apple TV paired with that exact tv and it did not have these symptoms just a slight delay in switching with match dynamic rang and match frame rate turned on. Do you have match frame rate and dynamic range turned on?

In my iCloud account under devices the new Apple TV 4K show up as “Apple TV” as opposed to the previous model (which I have) which shows up as “Apple TV 4K”

Can others check and tell if they see the same?

Aside from the model ID found under the physical device (A2169) everything else seem to indicate this is not a 4K Apple TV.

Something got mixed up somewhere… I hope Apple responds soon.

I'm seeing the exact same issue on my 2021 Apple TV 4K. I also know it's an issue with the new box as my 2017 Apple TV 4K does show 4K and Dolby Vision badges on the info overlay. I'm using John Wick 3 purchased from iTunes as my test video.

Info on my setup:

• Samsung Frame 2021 4K TV connected with HDMI 2.0b cable
• Fast internet (500+ Mb/s) via a cat 6 ethernet cable.

On both the 2021 and 2017 Apple TVs I have the following Video settings:

• Format: 4K HDR
• Chroma 4:2:2
• Match Content: Range and Frame Rate

For iTunes Movie and TV Shows settings I have:

• Video Resolution: Best Available
• Quick Start: On
• Limit Purchase and Rentals to SD: Off

Both are running TV OS 14.6 which is the latest version.

So, here we are a week after the 2021 ATV4K deployment and the HD / 4K / HDR stream quality issue / label issue remains. I know, there's a controversy over whether or not these new little hockey pucks are actually streaming and displaying 4K / UHD and its a HUD labeling issue, or if they are maligned HD models placed in the consumer pool by mistake. I'm on the fence - image is excellent but erroneous HUD 'HD' label *****. I've telephone Apple twice - both times clueless but very polite tier 1 techs would only provide the litany of 'check your hdmi cable, check your settings . . . ', but no acknowledgment of wide spread problem.

I then ordered a second identical 2021 ATV4K 64GB device, hoping that, 'no, couldn't receive two defunct models in a row', and it would function with a proper HUD. But, reading MikeyP's post about trying their 'new' ATV4K provided by a brick and mortar Apple store and observing no change in the problem, I hesitate to unseal the second ATV4K package if it's just going to continue to display bogus HUD info.

I think that what 'we' may be seeing is that 'we' ATV4K users are truly becoming another family of Apple's orphans -- took Apple what, 4 years, to come up with a model that is just slightly an upgrade over an existing model, and upon shipping, contained the HUD bug. A week after launch and Apple continues to deny a problem.

[Edited by Moderator]

Same issue with my new Apple TV 4K 2021. I contacted Apple support this week and they were no help. The issue was just starting to bubble up to them. I exchanged my unit at the Apple Store today but no difference with the new one. iTunes Movies, Netflix, Prime and Hulu 4K content show as HD in the drop down badge. Content in the Apple TV App is fine. The same native apps on my Sony OLED TV all show 4K correctly.

Very disappointed with Apple. Maybe the badge metadata is just incorrect, but for the hype of this unit and cost, everything should work perfectly. Get Tim Cook on the phone.

Well considering A: no one could even tell the difference because B: as the other person on the thread has shown it is a labeling issue and doesn’t actually appear to no be delivering 4K returning it seems a bit much.

It's definitely a labeling issue. If there is an HD title streaming, even though the system upscales to 4K, in developer HUD, in natural size, we see 1080. So, in natural size is being mentioned the original file's resolution and not the upscaled one's. Try to play a 4K and an HD title from Netflix in developer mode and you 'll see that is definitely a labeling issue.

But, as I said before, this is not a "closed" issue.

sorry for my bad English, guys

here you can read about this current problem too:

https://forums.macrumors.com/forums/apple-tv-and-home-theater.100/

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/new-apple-tv-4k-is-showing-4k-content-just-mislabeling-it-as-hd-in-some-apps-swipe-down-menu.2298143/

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/new-apple-tv-4k-nothing-playing-in-4k.2297418/

I still don’t understand why everyone’s big solution is to return it. Returning it will do nothing to get it resolved, and it is simply the label, it not like it isn’t playing 4K. Is that badge really so important to everyone? Do they stare at the 4K badge instead of watching the content? It’s already been in the media, so I’m sure Apple is aware of it. The best thing you can do is call Apple, let them know you are having the problem. The more open cases on the subject the more likely it is to be resolved. Returning it, specially when it is actually working except for labeling it wrong, seems a bit drastic and also doesn’t tell Apple why you returned it.

No change yet with 14.6. Note that for some mysterious reason, not all are experiencing this issue. I look forward to a 14.7 fix. I am already on a second unit and not returning. The picture looks 4K although I notice with none HDR 4K like Hulu Handmaids Tale, the top and bottom bars are not solid black on my OLED as with Dolby Vision content. Thanks for all the updates.

When I am running my apple tv through my soundbar, I can't even get the apple tv to set to 4k in settings. If I connect TV and Apple TV 4k directly, at least in the settings it goes to 4k.

Is this a different problem? Trying to figure out if my soundbar is too old or I should return my ATV4k.

That is simply not true… From the beginning you could pull up the developer menu and play a Netflix movie and it would show a natural resolution and bit-rate of 4K. It was only the badge and bad Netflix customer support people telling people it wasn’t streaming natively in 4K. It was shown in that link I posted earlier.

I think some people just want to troll around and pretend they know everything.

I never had the labeling issue (Netflix UI was always showing 4k) but when my AV receiver shows that it is receiving 1080p as input, it is what it is, regardless of the label or what someone on a forum says.

Someone somewhere must have fixed something because now on the latest beta my receiver shows 4K as the input video stream. Either Apple or Netflix must have fixed something on their end.

Now, the device still shows as Apple TV (without 4K) in my Apple ID account. Not a huge deal, but still a tiny bit annoying.

just to add that I bought an AppleTV 4 K (2021) yesterday and I’m having the same issue of wrongly labelled Amazon Prime UHD videos, but I would just add that I have the latest software mentioned by others above, and it HASNT fixed the issue - the videos are still labelled as “HD”. 

I can confirm they are streaming UHD/4K as I watched the same UHD film of the LG SmartTV Amazon app as the AppleTV Amazon app; and I looked at the streaming bandwidth pulled down from my ISP and the AppleTV app was pulling an average of 10 Mb/s (peaking at 19.2 Mb/s), whereas the SmartTV Amazon app only managed about 5 Mb/s (peaking at 7 Mb/s).

ive seen higher on UHD/4K streaming but that clearly depends on the compression used when the film was digitised.

watching an Apple TV+ show tonight I find that the Info drop down tab is missing altogether!