Smart TV Owners Are Cleaning Their TVs the Smart Way with AI

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Another AI trend is spreading across the internet, and this time it has nothing to do with generating images in different art styles. This time, it’s smart TV users who are fed up with their smart TVs. Many users have started turning to AI to vibe-code programs that can help debloat their smart TVs.

So the bigger question out there is: should you make use of such debloating apps? If you’re on the fence about using these tools, here’s everything that you need to know about debloating your smart TVs.

Why Do People Want to Debloat Their TVs?

There are a lot of reasons why smart TV owners are using AI to debloat their TVs. First and foremost are the ads and the recommendations. People are fed up with the space that these ads and recommendations take up on the home screen. Smart TV home screens, especially the TVs running on Android and Google TV OS, have become crowded and have also resulted in a lot of lag when trying to navigate or browse through the apps on the home screen.

The second biggest reason is the bloatware present on smart TVs. Regardless of the price bracket, every smart TV comes preloaded with a bunch of apps and services that you simply do not use. While some apps can be uninstalled right away, there are specific apps that you simply cannot get rid of. Some TVs also come with unnecessary services for gaming, shopping, and even system-branded services. Smart TV users are fed up with such things, as these apps and services not only have ads and notifications of their own, but also eat up storage space, which is quite limited on these devices already.

The third reason is to improve performance and reduce the tracking and data collection that TV manufacturers have enabled on smart TVs, especially in the budget segments. There is also the need to bring a cleaner home screen experience not filled with sponsored content from apps and services- regardless of whether you use them or not.

What AI Tools Are Smart TV Users Using?

A lot of users are using AI coding agents such as Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, and even Google’s Gemini CLI to help users “hack” their smart TVs. Users are giving these AI agents access to their PCs that are connected to the TV, which runs commands via ADB. In this use case, these AI coding agents simply use scripts that are available online to debloat and “hack their smart TVs.”

Now, if you are looking for these scripts that you want the AI coding agent to use, cleanyourtv and dumbtv are two of the most popular scripts being used right now. So, if you are interested in trying to debloat your smart TV, we have the steps listed below for you to try it out by yourself.

How to Debloat Your Smart TV Using AI?

Before we run into the steps, there are a few things that you need to have ready.

Pre-requisites

Windows PC connected to the WiFi network
Smart TV running on Google TV or Android TV, also connected to the same wifi network.
AI Coding Agent to run shell commands locally
The cleanyourtv script from GitHub.

Enable Developer Mode on your Smart TV

Now, it’s time to enable Developer Mode on your Smart TV. You can do this by selecting the Settings gear icon on the home screen, selecting System, followed by About or Device Preferences, and then About (this can vary on the Android version of your TV and also the smart TV brand). Highlight the Build option and press the Ok button on your remote until you get a toast notification on your TV saying that you are now a developer.

Go back to the Settings page and scroll down. You should see Developer Options in the list. Select it and scroll down to USB Debugging. Make sure to enable the option and check that your smart TV is connected to the same wifi network as that of your PC.

Setting up the AI Agent on your PC

Now that you have your smart TV ready, it’s time to set up the AI coding agent, which will connect to your smart TV and run the scripts from Cleanyourtv.

First off, launch the AI coding agent of your choice; for example purposes, we will be using Claude Code.
You can choose to install either the Claude Desktop app or have Claude Code installed in Windows Terminal.
Download the Claude Desktop app from here, or you can run this code in Windows Terminal to install it
- : irm https://claude.ai/install.ps1 | iex
- claude –version
- claude
Make sure to authenticate your account. You need to make sure that you have a paid Claude account; otherwise, you won’t be able to use it at all.
From the cleanyourtv script that you downloaded from GitHub, open the Prompt.MD file and copy and paste the prompt into Claude Code.
Just make sure to add the exact TV model of your smart TV so that Claude can detect and connect to your TV via wifi.
Once the connection takes place, your TV will display the Allow USB Debugging pop-up. Make sure to verify that the request is coming from your PC, and then grant the USB debugging permission on your TV.
Now, you need to check and approve what scripts you want Claude to run on your TV. Do not blindly approve everything, as this could result in your TV freezing up or even run into booting issues.
Once the necessary functions and removal or disabling of apps and services have been completed, test the basic functions and apps that you use on your TV to ensure nothing is broken.
Once it’s all good, Claude Code will now install the Cleanyourtv launcher.
After the launcher has been installed, use your TV remote to ensure that the launcher is working fine and that all basic functions that you generally use are working.

Once you are satisfied with all the work that has been done and your TV is functioning properly, make sure to disable USB debugging on your TV.

What Type of TVs Will Work With These Scripts?

These types of scripts will work best only with smart TVs running on Android TV and Google TV. If you have a smart TV from Samsung, LG, or even a TV powered by RokuOS, these scripts will not work. In this case,e you’ll have to manually debloat and manage the necessary settings on your system if you plan to make your smart TV into a dumb TV.

If you plan to use the Cleanyourtv script with AI on your Android smart TVs, here is the brand list and the number of models the script will work on.

Amazon Fire TV: 7
CHIQ: 2
EKO: 2
Ffalcon: 2
Google: 3
Grundig: 3
Haier: 3
Hisense: 13
Hitachi: 2
Insignia Fire TV: 2
JVC: 5
Kalley: 2
Kogan: 2
Motorola: 3
Nokia: 2
NVIDIA Shield: 3
OnePlus: 4
Panasonic: 6
Philips: 21
RCA: 3
Redmi: 3
Sharp: 8
Skyworth: 15
Sony: 41
TCL: 78
Thomson: 4
Toshiba: 3
Vu: 3
Xiaomi: 34

While the list still misses out on other popular FireTV and Android/Google smart TVs and plug-in devices, there are many users out there who are trying these scripts to see if it works on their particular smart TV brand and model and will eventually add to the list of supported TVs over at GitHub. So, make sure to keep checking the list out for new additions by heading here.

What To Do If You Don’t Want to Use AI to Debloat Your TVs?

You can always manually debloat and disable apps and features that you do not use on your smart TV. Settings such as personalization, microphone permissions, and tracking settings such as ACR can be manually turned off by the user. In the case of a home screen upgrade that is simple and smooth with no ads or recommendations, you can try out the following launchers that can be installed from the Google Play Store or sideloaded from genuine sources.

Closing Thoughts

What do you think about smart TV users now making use of AI to help them debloat and increase privacy on their smart TVs? Is this something that you plan to make use of, or do you prefer to manually debloat and play around with each setting present in your TV’s operating system?

With the rise of such vibe-coded AI projects that are helping smart TV users reclaim control of their TVs, do you think smart TV manufacturers will finally change the way TVs function, especially on the software side of things? Let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.

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