BBC Kids is the international children's brand of

BBC Studios BBC Studios Limited is a British content company. It is a commercial subsidiary of the BBC that was formed in April 2018 through the merger of the BBC's commercial production arm and the BBC's commercial international distribution arm, BBC Wor ...

, and has been applied to a number of TV services. It draws from the long history of children's programming on the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

, and is strongly related to the

CBBC CBBC is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the brand used for all BBC content for children aged 6 to 12. Its sister c ...

channel in the United Kingdom.

History

Canada

The BBC Kids brand was first introduced in Canada with the launch of the BBC Kids channel on 5 November 2001. It was described as a specialty television service devoted to educational and entertaining programming for children and youth (ages 2–17). Most of the channel's programming was from the UK. The channel was a joint venture between

Alliance Atlantis Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. (commonly known as Alliance Atlantis) was a Canadian media company that operated primarily as a specialty service operator in Canada. Alliance Atlantis also had offices in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Halifax, Los ...

and

BBC Worldwide BBC Worldwide Ltd. was the wholly owned commercial subsidiary of the BBC, formed out of a restructuring of its predecessor BBC Enterprises in January 1995. The company monetised BBC brands, selling BBC and other British programming for broadcas ...

, the BBC's overseas operating arm. Control was eventually transferred to Knowledge Network Corporation, a

Crown corporation Crown corporation () is the term used in Canada for organizations that are structured like private companies, but are directly and wholly owned by the government. Crown corporations have a long-standing presence in the country, and have a sign ...

of the Government of British Columbia with BBC Worldwide retaining its existing interest. On 2 October 2018, a joint statement from

Knowledge Network Knowledge Network, also branded as British Columbia's Knowledge Network and K:, is a Canadian publicly funded educational cable television network serving the province of British Columbia. It is owned by the Knowledge Network Corporation, a Crow ...

and BBC announced the channel would cease operations at the stroke of midnight on 1 January 2019. The channel's license was revoked by the CRTC on 10 January 2019, at the request of Knowledge.

Australia

BBC Kids launched on 24 April 2021 on Fetch TV in response to

Cartoon Network Cartoon Network (CN) is an American cable television television channel, channel and the flagship property of the Cartoon Network, Inc., a sub-division of the Warner Bros. Discovery Networks division of Warner Bros. Discovery. It launched on ...

and

Boomerang A boomerang () is a thrown tool typically constructed with airfoil sections and designed to spin about an axis perpendicular to the direction of its flight, designed to return to the thrower. The origin of the word is from Australian Aborigin ...

entering an exclusivity agreement with

Foxtel NXE Australia Pty Ltd, trading as the Foxtel Group, is an Australian pay television company that operates cable television, direct-broadcast satellite, direct broadcast satellite television, and IPTV streaming services. It was formed in April ...

and departing the Fetch lineup. This complemented an existing

CBeebies CBeebies is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast children's television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is also the brand used for all BBC content targeted for children aged six year ...

channel available in Australia, catering to children aged 0 to 6. The channel was launched with popular children's shows from the UK. It was removed from Fetch TV alongside CBeebies on 31 October 2024.

Online services

On 11 January 2022, BBC Studios added BBC Kids as an additional channel to the

Pluto TV Pluto TV is an American free ad-supported streaming television service owned and operated by the Paramount Streaming division of Paramount Global. Founded by Tom Ryan (business executive), Tom Ryan, Ilya Pozin and Nick Grouf in 2013 and based in ...

platform in the United States, both in English (as "BBC Kids") and in Spanish (as "Niños por BBC").

Taiwan Mobile Taiwan Mobile () is a mobile phone operator based in Taiwan. It is the second largest telecom company behind Chunghwa Telecom. History Taiwan Mobile started as part of a strategic divestment from the now defunct Pacific Electric Wire & Cabl ...

myVideo has become the first streaming platform in Asia to launch BBC Kids as a Video on Demand channel, which was launched on 1 July 2022. The channel has included titles that had been previously aired on CBeebies Asia to bring along other titles that was tailored for kids audiences, such as Spy in the Wild and Deadly 60. A BBC Kids subscription app service with 100 hours of content became available in South Africa in September 2022, through a partnership of Switch Media and

MTN Group MTN Group Limited (formerly M-Cell) is a South Africa, South African multinational corporation and mobile telecommunications provider. Its head office is in Johannesburg. MTN is among the List of mobile network operators, largest mobile netwo ...

Distribution

Current distribution

Former distribution

References

External links

Australian website
{{BBC Television International BBC television channels Television channels and stations established in 2001 BBC Worldwide