The majority of Kodi add-ons are obtained through third-party repositories. These repositories are maintained by communities and don’t last forever. Some are even forced offline due to legal pressure. In some cases completely legitimate add-ons are affected and adding new repositories or add-ons to continue accessing specific content.
Adding repositories and add-ons to Kodi is fairly straight forward. You can follow the general instructions below to add a repository and install any of its hosted add-ons.
For more information on Kodi and a list of popular add-ons, see How to stream tv shows, movies, and sports with Kodi.
Installation instructions for Repositories and Add-ons
- Launch Kodi.
- Navigate to Settings→ File Manager.
- Select Add Source.
- In the path text field, type the URL for a repository (for example, “http://domain.com/repo”). Navigate to the name text field and give it a relevant name and then select Ok.
- Go back to the main screen (the easiest method is to use your keyboard’s Backspace key) and select Settings → System Setting → Addons and enable Unknown sources.
- Go back to the main screen and select Add-ons → My Add-ons and then select “..” (this will take you to the main Addons page).
- Select Install from a zip file.
- Select the name of the repository you specified in step 4 and then select the repository’s zip file (for example, “repository-x.x.x.zip”). It could take anywhere from a few seconds to a few minutes to install and you may not receive a confirmation prompt. Just wait a minute or two before proceeding to the next step.
- Select Install from repository.
- Select the name of the repository you specified in step 4. Browse the list of add-ons and install the ones you’d like.
- Some add-ons might need to be enabled (new security feature in Kodi 17). Select the recently installed add-on again and confirm the add-on is enabled. If it’s not already enabled, enable it.
- The Add-ons will appear on the main screen under Add-ons. If for some reason the add-on doesn’t show up, exit Kodi and then re-open Kodi.
