Fire Stick or Apple TV

[homebirds]

I'm struggling to buy for my teens - they have TVs in their rooms but I'm struggling to work out what the Fire Stick is or does and the same with Apple TV.
Do they work with any tv - why would anyone want them?

I have a firestick, I love it! You can get Netflix, tv catchup (iplayer, all 4, etc) you can also get games on it and if you have an amazon prime account you can watch all the prime videos on it plus you can buy films and tv series too.

It basically turns a normal tv into a smart tv.

Perfect thanks - I assume it must be easy to set up? And is any tv ok?

It goes into a hdmi slot on the tv, plugged into the mains and connected to the WiFi

daft questions but can you still watch TV normally?

another daft question... is this better than just plugging laptop into the TV through HDMI and watching netflix, cach up etc?