Xbox Backwards Compatibility Gets Even Better With New Remote Play Feature

Here at Pure Xbox we've long raved about how good Xbox backwards compatibility is - having the option to play all of those OG Xbox and Xbox 360 games on modern hardware, often with notable performance boosts, is absolutely fantastic. This month, Team Xbox is improving the service even further with the addition of remote play functionality.

As part of a feature-packed monthly update for April 2025, Microsoft is adding the ability to stream "backward compatible games from the original Xbox and Xbox 360" using remote play. Remote play is where you access your console remotely from another device to play your Xbox library on another screen - and it works pretty darn well.

Up to this point, you've never been able to remote play Xbox back compat games, so we absolutely welcome this feature in 2025. The only downside with this news is that Microsoft has officially ended remote play support via the Xbox mobile app — you now have to use an internet browser to access it on Android and iOS — but here's hoping it continues to work as well as it has in the past.

"By unifying Xbox remote play and Xbox Cloud Gaming on Xbox.com, we’re able to support more devices, open access to the store on the Xbox app on mobile, and make it easier for our teams to optimize the streaming experience and build new features going forward. As a bonus, starting this month, backward compatible games from the original Xbox and Xbox 360 will be streamable via remote play across all supported devices."

In addition to this, Microsoft says that remote play is getting wider device support in the near future, with "supported Samsung Smart TVs, Amazon Fire TV devices, and Meta Quest headsets" becoming remote play compatible soon as Xbox expands the feature's functionality.

What do we think of this new feature? Tell us if you'll make use of it down below!