Can anyone help me work out why ipLayer is so temperamental on our telly? Panasonic Viera smart TV with Plusnet wi-fi internet (which works fine on our devices) and 9 times out of 10 we can’t connect to watch stuff. Connection drops while loading. Any tips or knowledge gratefully received. Ta!

– Do you have other streaming services on the telly that work OK?

– How close is your telly to your wifi router? Any thick walls in the way? Do other devices work OK when next to the telly? Any chance of using a cable rather than wifi?

– How fast is your broadband? When it doesn’t work, are any other devices connected to your Wifi doing large data transfers? Kids upstairs streaming stuff?

Did you fail the test where it asks if you have a TV licence?

Apps in ‘smart’ TVs are often shite. Do you have some other device you can use as a source?

Is the app up to date?

Can you try it wired rather than over Wi-Fi?

Cheers, folk. Got a TV licence, thanks. TV and router are close, no walls, no kids downloading stuff, broadband is fast for everything else, and Netflix works fine. Just iPlayer playing silly b*ggers. Been trying to watch episode three of Spiral for the last three nights, giving up after 20 mins of “something went wrong…” or just returning to TV with no warning before we’ve even begun Spiral.

We are having the same problem with iPlayer on a Sony TV. I think it is down to the TV app Sony use as the Samsung TV in another room never fails to load or play iPlayer.

Have you checked for any updates for your Viera TV?

 Cougar

Apps in ‘smart’ TVs are often shite. Do you have some other device you can use as a source?

This. Gave up with our ‘smart’ tv on iPlayer and Red Bull tv. Use the app on my phone and ‘cast’ to the telly with a chromecast instead.

Had this on a Sumsung ‘Smart TV’ the other day where iPlayer just loads with the purple background.

Other Apps like All4 and Amazon were ok.

Had to do a ‘Smart Hub Reset’ – the apps are then refreshed and iPlayer worked again

@wl – we had the exact same problem with our Panasonic Viera. Panasonic only fully support the apps for 2 or 3 years then you’re on your own.

We bought a Google Chromecast for £25 last year and run iPlayer from a smartphone or tablet. It’s better than the built-in App in every way possible !!

Brilliant, thanks for these replies. I’ll investigate the above and buy a Chromecast thingy if necessary. I bought the telly more for its decent picture so not massively bothered if I need to shell out a bit for the smart thing – it wasn’t high on my priority list. Thanks all. Much appreciated.