Gaming is more accessible than ever on LG smart TVs.
On July 24, the cloud gaming platform Phynd launched in beta on LG smart TV devices, allowing owners of LG smart TVs manufactured in 2021 or later and running webOS 6.0 or higher to play games like Deathbound, Smurfs Kart, and Garfield Lasagna Party directly through LG Apps and the LG Gaming Portal.
Since launching two months ago, Phynd’s gaming app has been downloaded over 7 million times, according to Phynd chairman and chief executive officer André Swanston in an interview with GamesBeat. Phynd’s app launched on Samsung smart TVs in May 2026, and the company is planning to launch a beta test on Amazon devices later this year. Showing up in LG’s Gaming Portal gives Phynd access to an audience of “millions of users,” per LG vice president Bo Moon in an interview with GamesBeat.
“Beta just means it’s our first version of the launch of the platform across LG, and so we wanted to make it available to as many people as possible,” Swanston said. “We’re still adding features on, frankly, a weekly basis — we’re adding more games every week — and so it’s just letting people know we want to get their feedback.”
LG’s Gaming Portal features a large library of experiences, including both cloud gaming services like Amazon Luna and Xbox Cloud Gaming and native casual games that run directly on the TV. A unique element of Phynd’s rollout on the platform is that LG’s Gaming Portal will list Phynd-served games as individual, standalone apps, with the goal of creating more discoverability for Phynd games.
“We promote it very heavily, especially no-friction gaming experiences like what Phynd offers,” Moon said. “We run promotions within our own ad inventory, but what we’ll also do is, during events lik LG Streaming Week, which is a promotion where we put together a lot of offers to our customers, we’ll also include many of our gaming partners’ content in that promotion.”
Standalone apps are not the only way Phynd and LG are looking to make gaming more accessible on CTV devices. In January, LG collaborated with Razer to design a low-latency Bluetooth controller intended for smart TV play, and the company has incorporated controller elements like an internal gyroscope into its remote control devices to allow them to work as controllers for some games.
“We definitely want to make sure that there’s no friction,” Moon said.
LG’s efforts appear to be paying off so far: Moon told GamesBeat that game usage hours and total sessions had all “increased dramatically” year-over-year “in a non-linear way” since LG launched its Gaming Portal in early 2025, although he declined to share exact numbers.
“We’re excited to say it’s accelerating in growth,” he said. “We very strongly feel that gaming is a major focus as a key entertainment pillar, and partners like Phynd are really validating the idea that people are looking at the TV and the living room as a place for their next gaming experiences.”
Swanston told GamesBeat that Phynd doesn’t have a “hard-and-fast timeline” to move from beta into a full launch on LG smart TVs. At the moment, Phynd’s goal is to increase the total addressable audience of gaming, per Swanston, who said households in many developing markets are more likely to have a smart TV than a dedicated gaming console.
“When we feel that we’ve proven at scale that we’re able to deliver the experience — and allow brands and sponsors to enhance that and monetize the audience for the players — I think that’s when we would we would say that,” Swanston said.