EPG · XMLTV

What is an EPG?

An EPG, an electronic programme guide, is the list of what is on each channel and when. For IPTV it almost always comes as an XMLTV file: one document at its own address, which a player downloads and lays out as a guide.

Lumen·TV is an IPTV player for Android TV, Google TV, Fire TV and Android phones and tablets. It needs Android 8.0 or later. It plays the M3U or Xtream Codes playlist you already have, and includes no channels. 21 days free, then €0.99 a month for one device, or €19.99 once for 2 devices, or €29.99 once for 5. The trial needs no card and ends by itself.

Updated 28 October 2026

What an XMLTV file holds.

Two kinds of entry. A <channel> for each channel the guide covers, with an id and a name; and a <programme> for each programme, naming its channel by that id, with a start, an end, a title and often a description.

<tv>
  <channel id="news24.example">
    <display-name>News 24</display-name>
  </channel>
  <programme channel="news24.example" start="20261021190000 +0200" stop="20261021200000 +0200">
    <title>Evening bulletin</title>
    <desc>Headlines, weather, sport.</desc>
  </programme>
</tv>

One channel and one of its programmes. Each time carries its own offset from UTC, here two hours ahead.

Its size: A week of programmes for a large playlist runs to many megabytes, so guides are often published compressed, as .xml.gz.
How far ahead: As far as the publisher fills it: a few days, a week, sometimes more.

How a guide finds your channels: tvg-id.

The guide and the playlist are separate files, often from separate places, and one thing ties them together: the tvg-id on a channel’s line in the M3U playlist has to be exactly the id of a channel in the guide. tvg-id="news24.example" finds the programmes of channel="news24.example"; tvg-id="News24" finds none.

So when a guide loads but shows nothing for your channels, the usual reason is that the two files name their channels differently, and only whoever publishes them can make them agree. An Xtream Codes server publishes its channel list and its guide together, which is why the two usually agree.

Where the guide’s address comes from.

With an Xtream Codes login: The server publishes the guide at xmltv.php, opened with the same username and password, so a player can find it by itself. See what Xtream Codes is.
With an M3U playlist: The guide is a second address, which providers usually publish beside the playlist link. Some write it on the playlist’s first line, as url-tvg; whether a player reads it from there depends on the player.
From somewhere else: Any XMLTV address will do, as long as its ids match the playlist’s.

What Lumen·TV does with a guide.

One guide per playlist, drawn as a timeline you page through half an hour or a day at a time, and as now and next over the picture.
As many days as your provider publishes, up to seven.
An Xtream Codes login, or a get.php link, finds its guide by itself. A plain M3U needs the guide’s address given separately: Lumen·TV does not read one written inside the playlist. Adding a guide, step by step.
Matches programmes to channels by tvg-id alone, and reads a guide published compressed (.xml.gz) as well as plain.
Says why a guide is empty: no address, an address that holds no programmes, channels with no tvg-id, ids that match nothing, or a guide its provider stopped updating.
Several guides merged into one, a guide time offset and reminders are not part of the app.