Amazon has been on a mission lately to completely transform its Fire TV Stick lineup, and it all began last year when the company unveiled its new Linux-based operating system, Vega OS.
For more than a decade, Amazon's Fire TV Sticks have run Fire OS, an Android-based operating system that lets users download Android apps, install custom launchers, and sideload apps. While these features helped make Fire TV Sticks popular in the first place, Vega OS doesn't support any of them because it's Linux-based. Amazon says the move is about “enhanced security,” while touting Vega OS's greater efficiency and improved performance.
So far, Amazon has released three Fire TV Sticks running Vega OS. First came the Fire TV Stick 4K Select, an entry-level 4K streaming stick launched last year. In April, Amazon released a new version of the Fire TV Stick HD, its entry-level 1080p streaming stick. More recently, in September, Amazon introduced the new Fire TV Stick 4K, replacing both the Fire TV Stick 4K Select and the Fire TV Stick 4K Plus in its lineup.
With Vega OS becoming increasingly dominant across Amazon's Fire TV Stick lineup, and the company confirming that all future models will run the new operating system, one big question is how much longer Amazon will support its older Android-based Fire TV Sticks. Fortunately, despite its big push toward Vega OS, Amazon won't update older Fire TV Sticks running Fire OS to the new operating system, meaning they'll remain on Android. And while many of these older streaming sticks do have an expiration date for software support, Amazon has surprisingly given them quite a long runway before that day arrives.
How long will Amazon support your Android Fire TV Stick?
It likely still has plenty of life left
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