5 Ways To Fix Roku Needs To Reauthenticate

At this point, Roku hardly need any introduction at all. Having come out of seemingly nowhere, they have managed to achieve such a level of popularity as to be able compete with the giants of the industry. 

For us, there is no real mystery or surprise as to how this happened. After all, they have an excellent range of content for their users to enjoy. They are also a really reliable service. No corners have been cut anywhere along the way. 

In general, it’s also pretty easy to sign up with them too. All you have to do is go through the subscription process, completing the authentication bits as you go along. 

Well, at least that’s how it is meant to go. However, as it turns out, there are quite a few of you out there who are having a vastly different experience when going through the steps. Instead of just breezing through it, many of you are getting a message that states “playback error needs to re-authenticate”. 

The regularity at which you are receiving these messages will vary from person to person. Some of you will only see it every month, with others are seeing it as often as every few days. 

So, to avoid any further annoyance, we decided to put together this little guide to help you stop this message popping up. First up, we are going to explain exactly what causes the problem in the first place. Then, we will show you how to get rid of it. With that, let’s get right into it!

Why is Roku Needs To reauthenticate? 

The only reason that Roku are asking you to do this is for a legal purpose. Essentially, they want you to confirm that you are accessing the content that you are watching in a legal manner. However, we do get that it should be enough that you do this once. 

After all, that should be enough, right? Well, the answer to this is both yes and no. Our best guess as to why it is this way is that Roku are that extra bit more vigilant because multiple users can access a single Roku account. That’s a lot more potential for content to be accessed in an unethical way. 

In actuality, there are any number of reasons why you could be getting this message on such a frequent basis. This makes narrowing the cause of it down a really tough ask. 

However, from what we can decipher, the most likely cause will be that some of your internet service providers have issues with the channels you have subscribed to. 

Another likely culprit is that a lot of activity, from a lot of different people, will have flagged your subscription to the service as somewhat suspect. Whatever the case, the fixes below should help you to get around the problem once and for all. So, with that, let’s get into the troubleshooting!

Getting rid of the Re-authentication message. 

1. Try logging out of your TV provider and then re-authenticate 

Let’s start with the more simple stuff first. In this step, we are essentially aiming to trick the system by logging out and then re-authenticating. If you haven’t done this before, just follow the steps below. 

• First up, navigate to “home” in the app. 
• Then, click into “more”.
• Next up, go into “my profile” and then scroll down to your TV provider.
• From here, you will need to unlink and then relink the subscribed channel.
• To relink, all you will need to do is log back in to your TV provider. 

And that’s all there is to it. While you are here, we would also recommend that you sign out of all apps provided by your TV provider and then re-authenticate using your TV provider in one fell swoop. 

After this, a good many of you should have noticed that the problem has disappeared. If not, it is time to move onto the next solution. 

2. Check the strength of your signal

Another likely cause of the problem is a really weak signal. So, before you continue with this troubleshooting guide, make sure that you are getting enough signal to stream content. 

After you have done so, and particularly if you have made any changes, make sure to test if it is working again.  If not, it is time to up the ante a little.

3. Remove and then re-add the apps 

The next thing we would recommend trying is to log out of each and every app that you have on Roku. Then, uninstall each of them one by one. Once you have removed all of the channels, you will need to wait for at least 5 minutes before continuing. 

Then, simply re-add everything that you had deleted. After this, you should notice that you are no longer receiving the dreaded re-authentication message any more. If not, it is time to check for outstanding updates. 

4. Make sure your apps and software are updated

Considering that you have already reinstalled all of your apps, these should all be in their most recent versions. However, the same may not be the case for your software. Before taking our last suggestion, it is best to make sure that everything is up to date. 

If anything is out of date, it is prone to bugs which can cause all sorts of performance issues if left unchecked. Once you have done this, it is time to move on to our final fix.

5. Try rebooting your Roku

If none of the above solutions has worked for you, you can definitely consider yourself as more than a little unlucky. However, it isn’t time to give up hope just yet. Our final fix is just a simple reboot in the hope that any outstanding bugs will be forced out of the system. 

All you need to do is plug out all of your Roku devices, after you have removed the apps from them. 

Once you have done this, plug them back in again and install just one channel for testing purposes. Now, try to stream and see if the issue has been cleared up. Hopefully, by now the re-authentication issue will have been cleared up for good.