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Amazon is bringing a much-needed feature to the Fire TV

Amazon’s (AMZN) new Fire TV is one of the best values you can find when it comes to TV streaming devices. It’s inexpensive, 4K HDR-capable and comes with the e-commerce giant’s Alexa smart assistant built in. And now you can sign into your favorite TV apps a heck of a lot easier.

One of the aspects about owning a Fire TV that has always been a pain has been signing into TV anywhere apps, or apps that are only available to cable or satellite subscribers.

That’s because whenever you want to access those apps for the first time, or haven’t used them in a while, you have to sign into that sign into your cable or satellite provider account before you’re allowed to access the TV anywhere app.

It’s a major annoyance, and easily the least consumer-friendly part about owning a Fire TV. There are TV anywhere apps that I decided aren’t worth the aggravation of signing in with my cable provider’s information just to watch a show that I can watch on-demand.

Which is why Amazon’s single-sign-on feature is such a welcome addition to its streaming device. With single-sign-on you simply sign into your cable or satellite provider account once, and the Fire TV will use the credentials for all participating single-sign-on apps.

Amazon says that single-sign-on will work with AT&T’s (T) Uverse, DirecTV, Dish (DISH), Cablevision (ATUS), Cox, Verizon’s (VZ) Fios (Verizon is the parent company of Yahoo Finance.) and other cable and satellite providers.

So far 18 apps support single-sign-on including A&E, AMC, BBC, Bravo, CNNgo, Cooking Channel, DIY, E!, Food Network, Freeform, Hallmark, History, Syfy, Telemundo and USA. Amazon says it’s working to bring TBS and TNT apps into the fold soon, and is working on adding broadcast channels like ABC and NBC to its list of single-sign-on apps in the future.

Amazon is actually the last of the three major streaming device makers to add single-sign-on to its feature set. Apple’s (AAPL) Apple TV and Roku’s (ROKU) various streaming devices already support single-sign-on and it has made streaming TV channels worlds easier.

Single-sign-on is rolling out to consumers now, and should be available for your Fire TV the next time you sign on.

More from Dan:

Email Daniel Howley at dhowley@yahoo-inc.com; follow him on Twitter at @DanielHowley.

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