Ugoos AM8 Pro Review 2026: Still Worth It?

The Ugoos AM8 Pro sits in a strange spot. It costs more than a Fire TV Stick, runs an older version of Android, and skips the Google certification that most buyers assume they need. Yet home theater forums keep recommending it. Kodi users keep buying it. People who own it rarely sell it.

I spent several weeks with this box, feeding it 4K remuxes, Dolby Atmos tracks, retro game emulators, and plain old YouTube.

This review covers what the AM8 Pro does brilliantly, what it fumbles, and whether the price still makes sense in 2026.

In a Nutshell:

• The AM8 Pro is a media player first, a smart TV platform second. It runs the Amlogic S928X chip with 8GB of LPDDR4 RAM and 64GB of storage. Local file playback is close to flawless, and that is the entire point of this device.
• Kodi and Plex users get the biggest payoff. Automatic frame rate switching, full audio passthrough including TrueHD and DTS:X, and HDR handling all work without babysitting. This is the box that stops your projector from stuttering during 23.976fps films.
• Streaming app support is the weak spot. The box is not Netflix certified, so the official Netflix app tops out at low resolution. Disney Plus and Prime Video behave better, but this is not a plug and play replacement for a smart TV.
• Build quality punches above the price. A metal chassis, three USB 3.0 ports, gigabit ethernet, WiFi 6E, and HDMI 2.1 give it more physical connectivity than almost any competitor.
• Android 11 feels dated in 2026. Ugoos still pushes firmware updates, but you are buying an operating system that shipped years ago. Buy it for playback, not for app freshness.
• Expect to tinker. Sideloading, CoreELEC, and settings menus are part of the experience. Casual users will find it fussy.

Ugoos AM8 Pro Overview: What Exactly Are You Buying?

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The Ugoos AM8 Pro is an Android 11 media box built around the Amlogic S928X processor. It pairs a quad core Cortex A76 cluster with a quad core Cortex A55 cluster and a Mali G57 GPU. Ugoos gives it 8GB of LPDDR4 RAM and 64GB of eMMC storage, which is double the memory of the standard AM8.

On paper the headline feature is 8K playback at 60fps. In real life, almost nobody owns an 8K display, and that spec matters far less than the decoder support behind it. The chip handles AV1, HEVC, VP9, H.264, and VC1 in hardware. That means smooth playback of modern encodes without the CPU breaking a sweat.

Connectivity is generous. You get HDMI 2.1a output, gigabit ethernet, WiFi 6E across 2.4GHz, 5GHz, and 6GHz bands, Bluetooth 5.3, three USB 3.0 ports, one USB 2.0 port, a microSD slot, and an optical SPDIF output. Very few streaming devices at any price offer that many physical connections.

Pricing usually lands between 180 and 240 US dollars depending on the seller. That places it directly against the NVIDIA Shield TV Pro, which is the comparison most buyers care about.

Unboxing the Ugoos AM8 Pro

The packaging sets the tone. Ugoos ships the AM8 Pro in a compact matte black box with silver lettering and a product shot on the front. It feels closer to a phone box than the flimsy cardboard most Android boxes arrive in.

Lift the lid and the unit sits in a foam cradle, wrapped in a thin protective film. The first thing you notice is weight. The AM8 Pro is denser than expected because the top and sides use metal rather than glossy plastic. It does not creak. It does not flex.

Underneath the cradle you find the accessories tray. Inside there is a 12V power adapter, a short HDMI cable, a quick start leaflet, and the remote. Ugoos includes an air mouse style remote with a gyroscope, a microphone for voice input, and a learning function that copies your TV volume buttons.

The remote takes two AAA batteries, which are not included. That is a small annoyance at this price. The HDMI cable is also basic, so anyone chasing 4K120 or high bandwidth Dolby Vision should swap in a certified 48Gbps cable.

Setup takes about four minutes. Plug in power, connect HDMI, pick a language, join WiFi, and you land on the Ugoos launcher. No forced account creation, no ads on the home screen.

Design, Build Quality, and Cooling

The AM8 Pro measures roughly 117 by 117 by 22 millimetres. It is a flat square puck that disappears easily on a shelf or behind a TV. The top surface uses brushed metal with the Ugoos logo etched in one corner.

Port placement is sensible. The rear carries HDMI, ethernet, optical audio, two USB 3.0 ports, and the power input. The right side holds a third USB 3.0 port and the microSD slot. A small LED display on the front shows the clock during standby and the resolution during playback, which is a nice touch for anyone who verifies output modes.

Cooling matters here because the S928X runs warm under load. Ugoos uses a large internal heatsink bonded to the metal shell, plus a small fan that only spins up during sustained heavy work. During normal 4K playback the fan stayed silent in my testing. During long emulation sessions I could hear a faint hum from about a metre away.

The metal body does get noticeably warm to the touch, which is expected behaviour for a passive first cooling design. Do not stack anything on top of it and do not shove it inside a closed cabinet. Airflow keeps the chip from throttling.

Top 3 Alternatives for Ugoos AM8 Pro

Last update on 2026-08-28 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API Some of the links on this website are affiliate links, which means that at no additional cost to you, I earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase. I only recommend products and services that I believe will add value to my readers. Thank you for your support!

NVIDIA Shield Android TV Pro

Last update on 2026-08-28 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API Some of the links on this website are affiliate links, which means that at no additional cost to you, I earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase. I only recommend products and services that I believe will add value to my readers. Thank you for your support!

Ugoos AM6B Plus

Last update on 2026-08-28 / Affiliate links / Images from Amazon Product Advertising API Some of the links on this website are affiliate links, which means that at no additional cost to you, I earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase. I only recommend products and services that I believe will add value to my readers. Thank you for your support!

Ugoos SK1 Lite

Performance and Real World Speed

Benchmarks tell part of the story. The S928X posts Antutu scores in the region of 380,000 to 400,000, which puts it clearly ahead of the older S922X in the AM6B Plus and comfortably ahead of the Tegra X1 inside the Shield.

Day to day speed feels excellent. The launcher opens instantly. Apps load without the half second stutter common on cheaper boxes. Kodi libraries with tens of thousands of entries scroll smoothly. The 8GB of RAM means apps stay resident in memory, so switching between Plex and Kodi and YouTube does not force a reload every time.

Storage speed is respectable. The 64GB eMMC module reads fast enough that app installs and database writes never feel like a bottleneck. If you need more room, USB 3.0 drives mount quickly and support exFAT and NTFS out of the box.

Thermal throttling did appear during extended synthetic stress tests, with scores dropping around eight percent after twenty minutes. Real media playback never triggered it. The chip has far more headroom than any video file will ever demand, which is precisely why this box feels effortless in normal use.

Video Quality, HDR, and Dolby Vision

Picture output is where the AM8 Pro earns its reputation. HDMI 2.1a carries up to 8K at 60fps, 4K at 120fps, and full 12 bit colour depth. More importantly, the box respects the source.

Automatic frame rate switching works properly. A 23.976fps film outputs at 23.976fps. A 50fps broadcast recording outputs at 50Hz. There is no judder correction guesswork and no forced 60Hz conversion. Anyone who has watched a panning shot stutter on a cheap box knows how much this matters.

HDR handling covers HDR10, HDR10 Plus, HLG, and Dolby Vision. The Dolby Vision implementation supports profile 5 and profile 8 content, and tone mapping to standard dynamic range works cleanly when your display cannot handle HDR.

There is a real limitation to state plainly. The AM8 Pro does not support Dolby Vision profile 7 FEL, which is the full enhancement layer found on many UHD Blu ray rips. The box plays those files using the base layer, so you still get a good image, but purists chasing the exact disc presentation will notice the difference. The older AM6B Plus handles FEL under CoreELEC, and that alone keeps the older model relevant.

Audio Passthrough and Home Theater Use

Audio is the second pillar of this box. The AM8 Pro passes through Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD, Dolby Atmos, DTS, DTS HD Master Audio, and DTS:X without re encoding. Your receiver receives the original bitstream and lights up the correct format indicator.

That sounds basic. It is not. Plenty of Android boxes silently downmix TrueHD to stereo or convert Atmos to lossy Dolby Digital Plus. The AM8 Pro sends the untouched stream, which is the entire reason home theater owners buy it.

Multichannel AAC and FLAC files also decode correctly, including tracks with more than six channels that trip up other hardware. The optical SPDIF output remains available for older receivers, though it is limited to compressed 5.1 by the format itself.

Lip sync stayed accurate during my testing across several receivers. Ugoos includes an audio delay adjustment in settings for the rare case where your chain drifts.

If you own an Atmos capable receiver and a library of high bitrate remuxes, this is the strongest argument for the AM8 Pro. It behaves like a dedicated media player rather than a smart TV dongle pretending to be one.

Kodi, CoreELEC, and Plex Performance

Kodi runs beautifully. Install it from the Play Store or sideload the official APK, point it at your network share, and everything works. SMB and NFS mounts are stable. Direct play of 4K HEVC files at 80Mbps and above never buffered on wired ethernet.

CoreELEC support is available and popular. You can boot it from a microSD card or USB drive without touching the internal Android install, which means you keep both systems. CoreELEC unlocks finer control over output modes and gives some users better subtitle rendering and menu responsiveness.

Plex works in two ways. The official Plex app handles most content well, and direct play works for the majority of codecs. Plex Home Theater style users often prefer the Plex for Kodi addon combination instead, because it inherits Kodi’s superior audio passthrough behaviour.

One honest caveat: some users report that certain USB 3.0 external drives with SSD enclosures fail to mount reliably, while thumb drives and powered hard drives work fine. Check your enclosure chipset before planning to run a large local library from the side port. Network storage avoids the issue entirely.

Streaming Apps: Netflix, Disney Plus, and Prime Video

This is the section where the AM8 Pro loses points, and any review that skips it is not being straight with you.

The AM8 Pro is not a Google certified Android TV device. It runs standard Android 11 with the Play Store sideloaded through Ugoos firmware. Widevine L1 is present, which helps, but Netflix certification is separate and Ugoos does not have it.

The practical result is that the official Netflix app plays at low resolution. Most users work around this by casting from a phone, using a cheap certified stick for Netflix only, or using their TV’s built in app. It is a genuine inconvenience and you should factor it into your decision.

Disney Plus, Prime Video, and YouTube generally deliver higher quality, though results vary by firmware version and region. YouTube plays 4K AV1 content smoothly thanks to the hardware decoder.

Think of the AM8 Pro as a local media powerhouse with streaming as a bonus rather than the reverse. Buyers who mainly watch subscription services will be happier with a certified device and will save money doing it.

Gaming and Emulation

The Mali G57 GPU handles retro emulation with ease. PlayStation 1, Nintendo 64, Dreamcast, PSP, and most GameCube titles run at full speed through RetroArch or standalone emulators. PlayStation 2 emulation is playable in many titles but not universally smooth.

Bluetooth 5.3 pairs quickly with Xbox and PlayStation controllers, and the three USB ports accept wired pads without adapters. Input lag felt low through my testing on a display in game mode.

Cloud gaming works too. GeForce NOW and Xbox Cloud Gaming both run through their respective clients, and WiFi 6E gives enough bandwidth for stable 1080p60 streaming when your router supports the 6GHz band.

Native Android gaming is fine but limited. Many modern titles either refuse to install on a non certified device or lack controller support. The AM8 Pro is a good emulation machine and a poor mobile gaming machine.

Do not buy this box primarily for gaming. Buy it for video and treat the emulation ability as a genuinely enjoyable extra that justifies keeping it plugged in.

Connectivity: WiFi 6E, Ethernet, and Ports

Wired ethernet delivers the full gigabit speed. In my file transfer tests the box sustained transfers well beyond what any video file requires, and network playback of large remuxes never hitched.

WiFi 6E is the more interesting addition. On a compatible router the 6GHz band gave consistently high throughput with low latency and no interference from neighbouring networks. On 5GHz the performance was still strong. Signal reception at range was average rather than exceptional, which is normal for a metal bodied device.

Bluetooth 5.3 handles the remote, controllers, and headphones simultaneously without dropouts. Bluetooth audio does introduce the usual latency, so wired or HDMI audio remains the better route for film watching.

The USB layout deserves praise. Three USB 3.0 ports on a media box is unusual and genuinely useful. You can attach a drive, a keyboard dongle, and a 2.5 gigabit ethernet adapter at the same time, and yes, USB ethernet adapters do work for anyone wanting faster than gigabit networking.

The microSD slot supports high capacity cards, which makes CoreELEC dual booting simple and cheap.

Software, Firmware Updates, and Ugoos Settings

Ugoos builds its own firmware, and the custom settings menu is the hidden strength of this device. You get manual control over HDMI output resolution and refresh rate, colour space, colour depth, HDR modes, audio output format, CEC behaviour, fan curves, LED display brightness, and automatic frame rate switching.

Most boxes hide these settings or omit them entirely. Ugoos exposes them, which lets you match the output precisely to your display.

Over the air updates arrive periodically. Recent firmware releases have addressed system crashes, automatic frame rate issues in specific apps, and Dolby Vision behaviour. That is a better support record than most Chinese manufactured boxes, where firmware often stops the month after launch.

The honest downside is that the base remains Android 11. Ugoos has not upgraded the AM8 Pro to Android 14, and newer Ugoos models like the SK1 line ship with modern versions instead. Some apps will eventually require a higher API level.

The launcher itself is clean, ad free, and customisable, which is a small pleasure after using devices that fill the home screen with sponsored content.

What the Ugoos AM8 Pro Does Not Do Well

Every review should name the flaws clearly, so here they are without softening.

Netflix quality is poor through the official app because the device lacks certification. This is the single biggest complaint from buyers and it will not be fixed by firmware.

Dolby Vision profile 7 FEL is unsupported. Owners of large UHD Blu ray rip collections lose the enhancement layer, and the older AM6B Plus handles this better under CoreELEC.

Android 11 is old. The box shipped with it, still runs it, and app compatibility will slowly narrow over the coming years.

Some USB SSD enclosures fail to mount reliably. Thumb drives and powered drives work, but the inconsistency is frustrating on a device that advertises three USB 3.0 ports.

3D frame packed MVC playback is not supported, which matters to the small group still collecting 3D Blu rays.

The setup process assumes a willing tinkerer. Sideloading apps, adjusting output settings, and reading forum threads are part of ownership. Someone who wants to press one button and watch television will be happier elsewhere.

Pros and Cons of the Ugoos AM8 Pro

Pros

• Outstanding local media playback with correct automatic frame rate switching and no forced upscaling
• Full lossless audio passthrough including Dolby TrueHD, Atmos, DTS HD Master Audio, and DTS:X
• Powerful Amlogic S928X chip with 8GB RAM that keeps apps resident and menus fast
• Three USB 3.0 ports, gigabit ethernet, WiFi 6E, microSD, and optical audio in one small metal chassis
• Deep Ugoos settings menu that exposes controls other manufacturers hide
• Strong Kodi and CoreELEC support with a genuine dual boot option from microSD
• Clean launcher with no advertising and regular firmware updates from the manufacturer

Cons

• Not Netflix certified, so the official app plays at low resolution
• No Dolby Vision profile 7 FEL support for full fidelity UHD Blu ray rips
• Android 11 base is outdated compared with newer competitors running Android 14
• Certain USB SSD enclosures fail to mount consistently
• Fan becomes audible during heavy sustained load
• Remote ships without batteries and the bundled HDMI cable is basic
• Price sits close to the NVIDIA Shield TV Pro, which offers better app certification

Who Should Buy the Ugoos AM8 Pro?

Buy it if you keep a media library. If you rip discs, store remuxes on a NAS, run Plex or Jellyfin, and care about your receiver showing the correct Atmos indicator, this box does exactly what you want with almost no compromise.

Buy it if you use Kodi seriously. The frame rate handling, codec support, and CoreELEC compatibility make it one of the best Kodi platforms available in 2026.

Buy it if you value ports. Three USB 3.0 connections, optical audio, and a microSD slot solve real problems that dongles cannot.

Skip it if your viewing is mostly Netflix, Disney Plus, and Prime Video. A certified device costs a fraction of the price and delivers better quality on those specific services.

Skip it if you want a device that never asks anything of you. This box rewards curiosity and punishes impatience.

Consider the AM6B Plus instead if Dolby Vision FEL support matters more to you than raw speed. Consider a newer Ugoos SK1 model if you want a current Android version with similar playback strengths.

Final Verdict: Is the Ugoos AM8 Pro Worth It in 2026?

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The Ugoos AM8 Pro is a specialist tool wearing the shape of a general purpose streaming box. Judged as a smart TV platform it is mediocre, held back by an ageing Android version and missing Netflix certification. Judged as a local media player it is close to the best money can buy under 250 dollars.

What impressed me most was consistency. Files played correctly the first time. Audio formats passed through without fiddling. Frame rates matched the source. Those things sound unremarkable until you use hardware that gets them wrong.

The flaws are real and worth repeating. Netflix quality is poor. Profile 7 FEL is absent. Android 11 will age further. Some USB drives refuse to cooperate.

Yet none of those issues touch the core job this box was built for. If your evenings involve a projector, a receiver, and a hard drive full of films, the AM8 Pro earns its place on the shelf. If your evenings involve pressing the Netflix button on a remote, save your money.

Score: 8.5 out of 10 for media enthusiasts. Around 6 out of 10 for everyone else.

Frequently Asked Questions

Does the Ugoos AM8 Pro support Netflix in 4K?

No. The device is not Netflix certified, so the official app plays at low resolution. Most owners cast from a phone or use a separate certified device for Netflix. Disney Plus, Prime Video, and YouTube perform much better.

Can the Ugoos AM8 Pro run CoreELEC?

Yes. CoreELEC boots from a microSD card or USB drive without replacing the internal Android system. Many Kodi users prefer this route for finer control over video output and subtitle rendering.

Does the AM8 Pro support Dolby Vision?

It supports Dolby Vision profile 5 and profile 8. It does not support profile 7 FEL, the full enhancement layer found on many UHD Blu ray rips. Those files still play using the base layer.

Is the Ugoos AM8 Pro better than the NVIDIA Shield TV Pro?

For local file playback, audio passthrough, and raw processing power, yes. For app certification, Netflix quality, GeForce NOW integration, and long term software support, the Shield remains ahead. Your priorities decide the answer.

How much storage does the Ugoos AM8 Pro have?

It ships with 64GB of internal eMMC storage and 8GB of LPDDR4 RAM. You can expand storage with microSD cards or USB drives, though some SSD enclosures mount inconsistently.

Does the Ugoos AM8 Pro get firmware updates?

Yes. Ugoos releases over the air updates that fix crashes, refine automatic frame rate switching, and adjust Dolby Vision handling. The base operating system remains Android 11 and has not been upgraded to a newer version.

Is the fan noisy?

The fan stays silent during normal video playback. It becomes faintly audible during long emulation sessions or sustained heavy processing. Keeping the box in open air prevents most fan activity.