Record a live programme

What you will accomplish

You can record a current live programme or schedule a future one through connected Home DVR. The programme guide supplies a planned time window; you can review the end and add padding where the action allows it.

A supported connected service and source recording permission are prerequisites. Odyssey does not supply television channels or recording rights. A programme visible in the guide is not automatically recordable.

Open the recording action

1. Open Live and select the intended channel or programme in the guide.
2. For a channel, open its context actions and choose Record…. A programme detail can offer Record & Share.
3. Check the programme title, channel/source and date/time in the Home DVR action screen.
4. Review the recording controls before submitting. If the screen says Recording is unavailable for this source, resolve its permission rather than trying a different button.

Recording a programme after it has already ended cannot reconstruct its beginning through this action. Catch Up and a new live recording are different capabilities.

Set the timing for your platform

On iPhone, iPad and Mac (Catalyst), the action uses End Time. On Apple TV, a programme uses Extend End By; a recording without programme timing uses Duration.

For a future programme, Start Padding adds time before its scheduled beginning. End Padding adds time after the selected end. Check the combined effect if you also extend the end time.

Padding is extra scheduled recording time. It cannot recover footage from before a recording actually started, compensate for an offline host or guarantee that a programme guide’s timing is correct.

Create and confirm

1. For a future programme, choose Record Programme. For a programme already on air or a current channel recording, choose Record Now.
2. If the Watch from the DVR? confirmation appears, choose Record Only or Record and Watch, or choose Cancel before submitting.
3. Wait for the accepted result. Record and Watch can wait while Home DVR prepares a playback buffer; do not interpret that waiting screen as a completed recording.
4. Open Library → Recordings and inspect Scheduled to confirm the job and its status.

Keep the service host and authorised source available at the scheduled time. Closing the player’s screen is different from stopping the recording service.

Worked example

A programme is listed for 20:00–21:00. An owner schedules it in advance and adds five minutes of Start Padding plus ten minutes of End Padding. They confirm the displayed date and timing because a guide can be wrong or updated later.

After submission, they inspect Scheduled to confirm the programme was accepted. When the recording completes, they check Recorded and test the beginning and end. Adding padding reduces reliance on exact schedule boundaries, but it does not promise that every overrun will be captured.

Edit, stop or cancel

A scheduled programme can expose Edit Recording. Its editor uses Change End By on Apple TV and End Time on other supported native platforms, with Start Padding and End Padding. Choose Save Changes and confirm the refreshed result. An item that has started or otherwise changed may no longer be editable.

Stop Recording is for ending an active recording and saving the recorded part. Its confirmation explicitly says that the recorded part will be saved.

Cancel Schedule prevents a scheduled job from running. Discard Recording and a Cancel and Discard confirmation are destructive paths. Read the current action’s wording instead of treating stop, cancel and discard as interchangeable.

Common problems

The guide entry ended: this action cannot record a past beginning. Choose a future programme or a currently available authorised channel.

The action is uncertain after a timeout: use Check Action when offered and refresh the recording status before submitting again. You do not yet know whether the first request was accepted.

Source changed: use Refresh Source and review the current source permission. An old recording action can become invalid after its source changes.

Recording missed or failed: check host availability, storage, connection limits and source access. A successfully accepted schedule is not evidence that the later recording succeeded.

Can I record while watching? Source connection limits and service capacity matter. Test the supported arrangement and respect the provider’s allowed connections.