Mixer is a great streaming platform, but the iOS app needs some work

Microsoft purchased Beam over a year ago to push video game dissemination into the forefront of Microsoft's efforts. Since then, Microsoft inverse Beam's name to Mixer, integrated it into Windows 10, and increased its functionality on the Xbox One. It'south a solid streaming service that focuses on quick interaction with viewers and streamers engaging with audiences. Mixer is available on a number of platforms, though in that location notably isn't a kickoff-party UWP version, and I recently took the iOS version for a test run on my iPad Pro.

Using the app showed its potential to be a keen way to view streams but also highlighted flaws in the iOS version of Mixer.

To try the app out yourself, you can download it from the App Store for gratuitous.

See at Apple tree

Covering the basics

The master purpose of the Mixer app is to let viewers to detect streams, tune in, and interact with broadcasters. The iPad version of Mixer covers these bases with an easy to use interface; a smashing observe page to help you lot find more content and a annotate section inside each stream that you tin quickly toggle between being subconscious and being visible. The app recently gained support for Hypezone broadcasts so you lot can easily come across lots of different broadcasters playing your favorite games without you having to jump from stream to stream.

Mixer'due south interface is simple. Yous can spring between the habitation folio, creators you follow, and view your contour. Streaming to Mixer is separated into a unlike app, Mixer Create, so you can but focus on viewing content on your tablet.

Viewing streams showed petty to no lag, and the picture quality was crystal clear. I viewed all the streams I watched using my home WiFi and quality tin vary based on the streamer and your home connection, only as long as those are fast enough, the app itself can prove streams in excellent clarity.

Missing features and issues

While Mixer on iOS provides a good viewing feel, information technology doesn't take advantage of options that are available for developers on iOS. The start omission is that Mixer doesn't support persistent video overlays. This ways you can't switch your viewing mode over to motion picture-in-picture and go on watching in a smaller window even afterwards you lot get out the app. In an odd dichotomy, Mixer has flick-in-motion picture support if you stay within the awarding, but not if you leave the app. Secondly, in what I hope isn't condign a trend for Microsoft apps on iOS, Mixer doesn't support split-screen viewing on the iPad. You can have it float over your other applications, but that covers whatever is below Mixer. When I saw that Microsoft Edge didn't support split-screen viewing, I assumed information technology was because it is in beta but with Mixer non supporting it either, I retrieve information technology's worth keeping an eye on if Microsoft uses this feature in future apps.

Pic-in-picture and split up-screen viewing aren't as of import for Microsoft'due south other applications, but for a video-centric app like Mixer, you lot demand to exist able to take information technology on in the background while doing other things. Game streams can last a long fourth dimension and while they can exist extremely entertaining, having to commit your entire screen to viewing a Mixer stream is cumbersome.

Lastly, I ran into some crashes and bugs in the app. They didn't testify up that often when I was generally browsing but constitute at least 1 outcome that could crusade the entire app to crash every time. I think for an app that's going upwards against a well-established juggernaut in Twitch, yous need to have a rock solid feel or people are going to stick with what they know.

Overall thoughts

Mixer is a service that has shown promise in the year or so that Microsoft has owned it. It provides solid competition to Twitch while providing features that Twitch doesn't. The Mixer app on iOS is mostly solid, simply information technology has room to grow. The occasional bugs and missing features such as divide-screen support could turn off new users earlier they are firmly entrenched in the Mixer ecosystem. The app covers the basics such as viewing streams, commenting, and watching Hypezones for various games, but information technology hasn't been optimized to exist a great iPad app yet.

Pros

Makes information technology piece of cake to find streamers.
Allows interaction with streamers.
Free.

Cons

A bug that acquired crashing.
Lacks some iPad-specific features.

Run across at Apple

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