Popular TV tracking app TV Time will shut down due to the company’s focus on artificial intelligence

TV Time, a popular app for tracking the shows you watch and participating in community discussions, has been shut down. The company announced via in-app messages that the TV Time app will be discontinued, and will not provide the service after July 15, 2026.

The company blamed the cost of running the platform as the reason behind the decision, but a shift to a more AI-focused business appears to be the real reason.

“Although we loved supporting TV Time, it was no longer possible to continue running the service as a free app, and there was not enough demand for the paid app,” the letter read. “To everyone who has followed, discovered, and shared their love of TV and movies with us, thank you. Your passion and enthusiasm have made TV Time more than just an app. You’ve made it a community.”

The closure of TV Time marks the end of one of the largest communities of TV fans online, and underscores how the growth of the artificial intelligence industry is changing corporate priorities. As companies race to build AI products, consumer applications are sometimes shut down, even if they have active user bases. Another example of this trend is the read-later app Pocket, which still had loyal users but was shut down as its owner Mozilla prioritized building Firefox- and AI-enabled browsing experiences.

The TV Time app, which is owned by Whip Media, has more than 26 million lifetime installs, according to data from app intelligence provider Appfigures, and has seen nearly 29,000 new downloads over the past 30 days. (Whip Media itself often refers to TV Time’s more than 25 million users in marketing materials.) Within Whip Media, TV Time’s data has helped strengthen the media industry’s business intelligence ecosystem. This meant that the app alone did not have to be profitable as a consumer product, because the data it generated was the real value.

Things have changed at the company in recent months. Whip Media was acquired by direct lender Blue Torch Capital in early 2025, which envisioned a more AI-focused future for the company.

Under its new ownership, Whip Media has shifted from providing sentiment analysis, ratings predictions, content optimization, and other data that could inform TV Time, to instead focus on more profitable paths. This now includes the AI-powered automation and workflow management tool, Helix, which is used to enhance flow analytics and supply chain orchestration.

What is not clear is why the company did not sell the still very popular app instead of discontinuing it. (Maybe you didn’t want to help another company generate the kind of data that could make it a more formidable competitor in the media and entertainment business.)

Whip Media notes that data collected via TV Time will not be used as part of any commercial service after TV Time ends, and everyone’s personal data will be deleted.

The company says the app will be removed from app stores on July 15, but before that, users can request to download their data through a GDPR-compliant export tool.