NEWTVHow big are real IPTV playlists?
Bigger than most people expect. The largest playlist we measured was 340 MB with 1,234,673 entries, and a TV box with 4 GB of memory failed on a far smaller one. These are our own measurements from building a player.
What we measured
- One M3U file: 340 MB, with 1,234,673 entries. That is about 275 bytes for each entry.
- One list from an Xtream login: 72 MB.
- The three lists of one account together: 156 MB (live channels, films and series).
- One TV guide file: 66.5 MB.
- Streams at once: every account we measured allowed one stream at a time.
How to read these numbers
This is a small set of real playlists, not a survey, and the sizes show what can happen, not what is usual. Your own playlist may be much smaller. We do not name providers, and these numbers come from our own testing, not from viewers' devices.
Why size matters on a TV box
A list takes several times its file size once it is read into memory as a whole. A 72 MB list can need far more than 72 MB. In our testing, a TV box with 4 GB of memory failed this way, and the playlist stayed empty. Nothing was wrong with the box or the account: the list was simply read in one piece.
How a player can cope
- Read the list a piece at a time: a small part is in memory, never the whole list.
- Save as it goes: entries are saved in small batches, so memory stays low from start to end.
- Keep the old list until the new one is ready: a failed update then leaves the viewer with what they had.
- Keep only part of the guide: a guide file holds days of programmes, and a player needs only the hours around now.
What you can do
Use the free M3U checker to see how many entries your file has. If a big playlist will not load, read how to add an M3U playlist, or see how to choose an Android TV box.
Questions and answers
How many entries does a big playlist have?
The largest we measured had 1,234,673 entries in a 340 MB file. Many playlists are much smaller.
Why does my playlist load on a phone but not on my TV box?
It can be the memory. A player that reads the whole list at once needs several times the file's size in memory, and a TV box often has less to spare.
Can I quote these numbers?
Yes. Please link to this page, so readers can see how they were measured.
NewTV Player is a media player only: it comes with no channels, films or playlists. Before you add any content, make sure you have the legal right to watch it.