The D-pad — the ring of arrows around the center button — moves you between channels, menu items, and settings screens, while the center select button confirms whatever's highlighted. The back button exits a menu or backs out of a channel without stopping playback entirely, and the home button drops you straight back to the Firestick's main screen, closing nothing in the background. The three-line menu icon on most player apps opens channel groups, search, or settings depending on where you are in the app. None of this is unique to any one app — it's the same remote layout the Firestick uses everywhere, which is why controls tend to feel familiar even the first time you open a new player app.

Some player apps map extra functions onto the colored buttons on a standard remote — for instance, using a specific color to jump straight to the channel-groups menu instead of navigating there through several D-pad presses. This mapping generally carries over correctly when you're using a TV remote's colored buttons to control a paired Firestick, since both follow the same standard color-key layout most remotes share. Not every player app uses these buttons, though, and the ones that do often assign different functions to them, so check your specific app's settings or help menu rather than assuming a color does the same thing across apps.

Firestick's stock remote doesn't have a number keypad, so typing a channel number the way you might on a cable remote isn't an option by default. Most player apps work around this with an on-screen search you open with the menu button, letting you type a channel name or number using the D-pad and select, or with quick-jump lists organized by group instead of number. A few apps support pairing a phone as a secondary remote with a number pad built into its interface, which speeds this up if you're used to typing channel numbers directly rather than scrolling.

Holding the select button down on a channel typically opens a per-channel options menu in most player apps — adding it to favorites, viewing stream info, or similar shortcuts — without needing to dig through a separate settings screen. The Firestick remote's voice button opens Alexa for navigating menus and searching by voice, but it controls the Firestick's system-level search, not playback inside a player app directly, so it won't skip channels or adjust volume mid-stream. Volume and power buttons on newer Firestick remotes route through HDMI-CEC to control the TV itself, separate from anything the player app does.