Part 3: Adding additional Repositories (Repo’s) and installing Add-on’s

There are many wonderful add-on’s for XBMC that enhance and enrich the user experience. These add-on’s can be installed via repositories (or repo’s), containers if you like for many add-on’s developed by a group or individual developer. There are two types of repo, official and unofficial. There are two official repo’s developed and supported by the XBMC team, they are XBMC.org and XBMC.org PVR Addons. The official repo’s are packaged with XBMC. Unofficial repo’s are developed by 3rd parties and need to be downloaded separately, and support is not always available. You will probably want to use a mix of the two to get the best add-on’s and features for XBMC.

To install a new repo, you must find and download the .zip file. There is a list of common 3rd party repo’s maintained here.

To install the repo, navigate to the Addon Manager via “System > Addon’s“. Select “Install from ZIP“, navigate to the ZIP file, which can be stored on a USB disk or on a network file-share, and select it. You should see a notification in the bottom right of the screen notifying you the repo has been installed successfully.

To access the contents of a newly installed repo navigate to “System > Addon’s > Get Addon’s“. You should now see and be able to select the new repo from the list.

To install add-on’s from the new repo, simply navigate and click on chosen add-on, as before you should see a notification in the bottom right of the screen informing you the repo has been installed successfully. The new add-on will now be available to run under the appropriate add-on’s category (e.g. Programs / Video etc…)

For more information visit the XBMC wiki.