VortX 0.5.5: Lighter Sync, Hero Trailers and Your Next Episode

Build 274. VortX 0.5.5 fixes repeated conversion of unchanged 0.4 account data and reduces unnecessary background polling while live sync is healthy. These changes address a source of lag, stutter and delayed taps across the Apple apps. Hero trailers start again, Mac and iPad series pages open on your episode, and watched episode cards dim evenly. All packages are built by the public release workflow.

Fixed

• Repeated background conversion. 0.5.4's check for changed 0.4 account data could give a different answer for the same data because it rebuilt a preferences archive before fingerprinting it. This triggered unnecessary conversion and account uploads, including during playback. The check now fingerprints the original legacy fields consistently and ignores native fields rewritten by routine sync. Unchanged routine syncs skip conversion after it succeeds. Genuine legacy changes still convert, and separately linked Stremio profile accounts retain their periodic 30-minute refresh. Removing this repeated work also reduces competition with opening your account.
• Hero trailers never started on Home and title pages on iPhone, iPad and Mac, or on title pages on Apple TV. The clip waited for a step that never ran. It runs now.
• Mac and iPad open a series on your episode. A long season opened on episode 1. The episode grid now scrolls to the episode in progress, or the next one after the episode you last played.
• Watched episode cards are dimmer and clean. The whole card darkens and loses its colour evenly, instead of fading into a smeared double image.

Changed

• Less background polling, with live updates retained. A newer-change notification over the live sync connection still triggers a pull immediately. While that connection is responding, the fallback check runs every five minutes instead of every 3 seconds. If it disconnects or goes silent for 75 seconds, frequent fallback checks resume.
• A bigger Home billboard on Mac, running down to just above Customize.

Android

Android checks for missed changes every five minutes while its live sync connection is up, instead of every 3 seconds.

VortX is Apple first. The Android APK is still an early technical preview rather than the finished app, so expect missing features and rough edges.

Please test

• Use the app for a few minutes after the first launch, then watch something and check menu, tap and player responsiveness. With unchanged legacy data, the diagnostics log should no longer repeatedly show legacy_conversion run reason=changed. A first conversion, genuine legacy edits or a linked-account refresh can still produce a conversion entry.
• Close and reopen the app: the splash screen should be shorter than on 0.5.4.
• Leave Home open: the featured billboard should play its trailer muted.
• On Mac or iPad, open a series you are partway through: the episode list should open on your episode.
• Check that watched episodes look dimmed and clean.

Install

Mac (.dmg). Download VortX-macOS-v0.5.5-ci.dmg and drag VortX into Applications. If macOS blocks the app downloaded from this official release, use System Settings > Privacy & Security > Open Anyway, or run xattr -dr com.apple.quarantine /Applications/VortX.app. The command removes the download quarantine flag; it does not notarize the app or change its signature. The Mac app is for Apple silicon, needs macOS 14 or later, and is ad-hoc signed rather than notarized. macOS may ask for your password so VortX can use its saved sign-in information in Keychain after replacing the app; approve only a prompt that names VortX. Step-by-step guide: Install on Mac.

iPhone, iPad, Apple TV (sideload the IPA). The IPAs are unsigned, because VortX is open-source and distributed outside the App Store with no Apple Developer ID yet, so you re-sign them yourself with Sideloadly, AltStore / SideStore, or Signulous. No jailbreak. Use VortX-iOS-v0.5.5-ci.ipa for iPhone and iPad. On Apple TV, VortX-tvOS-v0.5.5-ci.ipa is VortX TV with Top Shelf, and VortX-tvOS-lite-v0.5.5-ci.ipa is VortX TV Lite without it; both need tvOS 18 or later. Step-by-step guide: Installing on iPhone, iPad, and Apple TV.

Android phone, tablet and TV. VortX-0.5.5-full-mpv-universal.apk includes VortX Player. VortX-0.5.5-play-media3-universal.apk is the Media3 variant. Each APK contains both the phone and the Android TV interface. Choose the variant you already use so it installs over your current version. The Play bundle is also attached for its distribution workflow.

The Apple and Android packages were built by the release workflow from the v0.5.5-rc.1 tag, the same commit as v0.5.5. SHA256SUMS-ci.txt lists a SHA-256 checksum for each Apple package so you can confirm your download is intact; check the Android packages with SHA256SUMS-android.txt and SIGNING_PROVENANCE.txt.