Sports fans do not think about which device they are using. They think about their team. A fan might check the score on their phone during lunch, watch the second half on their living room TV, and catch the post-game highlights on their tablet before bed. The platform has to follow them — not the other way around. This is the design problem VIP is built to solve.
A common mistake in sports app design is treating mobile and connected TV as separate products that happen to share a brand. They get different content libraries, different navigation structures, different account systems, and different notification strategies. The result is a fan who feels like they are using two unrelated apps that both happen to have the team's logo on them.
VIP's approach starts from the observation that mobile and CTV serve different moments in a fan's day, not different fans. Mobile is the always-available surface — it travels with the fan, receives push notifications, and handles short-session interactions like score checks, highlight clips, and schedule lookups. CTV is the lean-back surface — it is where fans settle in for a full game, a replay, or a long-form feature. Both surfaces need to know who the fan is and what they care about.
When these surfaces share a common identity layer and content infrastructure, they reinforce each other. A fan who gets a push notification on their phone about a game starting can open the CTV app and find that game immediately, without searching. A fan who watched the first half on mobile can resume on the TV from the same point. These are not advanced features — they are the baseline expectation for a platform that takes the fan experience seriously.
Authentication is where many multi-device sports platforms break down. Entering a username and password with a TV remote is a poor experience, and it creates enough friction that a meaningful percentage of fans will simply not log in — which means the platform loses the ability to personalize their experience and connect their viewing behavior to their broader fan profile.
The standard approach for CTV authentication is a device-activation flow: the fan opens the app on their TV, sees a short code on screen, and enters it on their phone or computer to authenticate. The TV app receives the authentication token and the fan is logged in — without ever typing a password on the TV. This flow is familiar to fans who have used streaming services, and it works reliably across Roku, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, and smart TV platforms.
The key is that this authentication connects to the same identity system as the mobile app and the website. The fan's account is one account, recognized everywhere. Their subscription status, their content preferences, their notification settings, and their viewing history are all attached to that single identity — not duplicated across separate platform-specific databases.
Content discovery works differently on mobile and CTV, and the interface needs to reflect that. On mobile, fans are often looking for something specific: the score of a game in progress, a highlight from last night, the schedule for the upcoming week. The navigation should be fast and direct, with the most time-sensitive content — live games, recent highlights — surfaced prominently.
On CTV, fans are more often browsing. They have settled in to watch something, but they may not have a specific piece of content in mind. The interface needs to reward browsing: large thumbnails, clear content categories, and a layout that communicates what is available without requiring the fan to navigate through multiple menus. The remote control interaction model — directional navigation, select, back — is slower than touch, so every additional step to reach content is a real cost.
Both surfaces benefit from personalization. A fan who has established their favorite team sees that team's content surfaced first — their live games, their recent highlights, their upcoming schedule. A fan who follows multiple teams or sports sees a home screen that reflects that breadth. The personalization is not algorithmic in a black-box sense; it is primarily driven by the fan's declared preferences and their viewing history, which are transparent and adjustable.
In a platform that covers multiple teams, conferences, or sports, the favorite team selection is the most important personalization signal. It determines what appears on the home screen, which notifications the fan receives, and how the content library is organized for them.
VIP's approach is to make favorite team selection explicit and prominent during onboarding, and to make it easy to adjust afterward. A fan who follows a single team should see that team's content immediately, without having to navigate past content for teams they do not follow. A fan who follows multiple teams — common in college sports, where alumni may follow their school across multiple sports — should be able to configure that and see a home screen that reflects it.
This personalization carries across devices. The fan who sets their favorite team on mobile sees the same personalized experience when they open the CTV app. They do not have to reconfigure their preferences on each device. The platform knows who they are and what they follow, and it applies that knowledge consistently.
Sports viewing has a rhythm that is different from entertainment viewing. A fan watching a game on TV will often have their phone out simultaneously — checking stats, reading commentary, texting with other fans. The second screen is not a distraction from the game; it is part of the experience. A platform that understands this can design for it rather than fighting it.
Screen switching also happens between sessions. A fan who starts watching a game on their phone during a commute wants to continue on their TV when they get home. A fan who watches a game live on TV wants to be able to find the replay on their phone the next morning. These transitions should be frictionless — the platform should remember where the fan was and make it easy to pick up where they left off.
The practical implication for platform design is that playback state needs to be stored server-side, not just locally on the device. A locally stored playback position is lost when the fan switches devices. A server-side position — attached to the fan's account — is available everywhere. This is a straightforward architectural decision, but it requires the platform to have a unified identity layer in place before it can be implemented.
Ryland Reed is Co-Founder and CEO of Videostream Interactive Partners. He has 25+ years of experience in media technology, including launching the first known FAST platform at CoolCast in 1999 and scaling ad distribution technology at DG Systems. He holds 7 patents across 17 filings, including interactive TV technology used by NBC, CBS, FOX, and Univision.
Published August 30, 2026 by Videostream Interactive Partners.