Posted Nov 25, 2025
What is ZapperBox?
ZapperBox is a device to watch and record local TV channels with an antenna. Local channels are free, you do not need to pay any monthly fees to watch them. You can also stream programs to any room in your home. Local channel include sports, news, ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, PBS, The CW, Univision, and many more.
What is NextGen TV or ATSC 3.0?
Over-the-air (OTA) TV is making a transition from HD to 4K. ZapperBox supports both the old ATSC 1.0 and the new ATSC 3.0 TV standards. See all the other benefits of ATSC 3.0 at this blog post. ZapperBox protects your investment as broadcasters transition to the new standard. ATSC 3.0 stations add "content protection", also called DRM or encryption, on about 75% of channels. Currently, ZapperBox is the only device that allows viewing, recording, playback and streaming of protected content to any room in the home.
Why is “The Unbound Gateway” release such a big deal?
Support for protected content on gateway connected devices means that finally the annoyances associated with content protection start receding into the background where they belong. Ordinary consumers should never notice it. Content protection should only come into the foreground when someone tries to make unapproved commercial use of media.
What does this release allow ZapperBox users to do?
With v3.4 protected content can be viewed, recorded and played back on a DVR. It can also be streamed to all ZapperBox devices in the home.
Read this blog post by Stephen Pendergast to get a sense of what has been accomplished by our team. A couple of quotes:
“This makes ZapperBox the only plug-and-play DVR capable of recording [and streaming] encrypted ATSC 3.0 channels as of November 2025.”
“ZapperBox successfully achieved Tuner profile certification (October 2023) and DVR profile certification (April 2024), demonstrating that A3SA certification is possible but requires significant engineering resources and time [16]. The company represents a case study in navigating A3SA's certification process.”
Content protection (DRM) is difficult to implement. As Stephen points out, some people have argued that it could not be done for gateways. And, no other gateway OEM has been able to deliver this functionality yet.
What comes next?
We plan to release apps for non-ZapperBox devices made by companies like Roku, Google, LG, Samsung, Apple, etc. to access protected content from ZapperBox gateways. See our gateway plans at this blog post.
What about accessing protected content when traveling away from home?
This is doable. We plan to work with A3SA to propose mechanisms that will enable this while preventing unauthorized use of media.
With ZapperBox, the best is yet to come!