This is a list of

digital television Digital television (DTV) is the transmission of television signals using digital encoding, in contrast to the earlier analog television technology which used analog signals. At the time of its development it was considered an innovative advanc ...

deployments by country, which summarises the process and progress of transition from analogue to digital broadcasting. The transition to digital television is a process that is happening at different paces around the world. Although digital

satellite television Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location. The signals are received via an outdoor parabolic antenna comm ...

is now commonplace, the switch to digital

cable Cable may refer to: Mechanical * Nautical cable, an assembly of three or more ropes woven against the weave of the ropes, rendering it virtually waterproof * Wire rope, a type of rope that consists of several strands of metal wire laid into a hel ...

and

terrestrial television Terrestrial television or over-the-air television (OTA) is a type of television broadcasting in which the signal transmission occurs via radio waves from the terrestrial (Earth-based) transmitter of a TV station to a TV receiver having an ant ...

has taken longer. See also

Digital terrestrial television Digital terrestrial television (DTTV or DTT, or DTTB with "broadcasting") is a technology for terrestrial television in which land-based (terrestrial) television stations broadcast television content by radio waves to televisions in consumers' ...

. Not all countries are compatible within each standard

DVB-T DVB-T, short for Digital Video Broadcasting – Terrestrial, is the DVB European-based consortium standard for the broadcast transmission of digital terrestrial television that was first published in 1997 and first broadcast in Singapore in Febr ...

ATSC Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC) standards are an American set of standards for digital television transmission over terrestrial, cable and satellite networks. It is largely a replacement for the analog NTSC standard and, like that ...

(North America),

DTMB DTMB (Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcast) is the digital TV standard for mobile and fixed devices, developed in the People's Republic of China. It is used there and in both of their special administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau), and ...

(China),

ISDB Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting (ISDB; Japanese language, Japanese: , ''Tōgō dejitaru hōsō sābisu'') is a Japanese broadcasting standard for digital television (DTV) and digital radio. ISDB supersedes both the NTSC-J analog telev ...

(of which there are two incompatible variations used in Japan and South America respectively). Countries that have adopted digital terrestrial recently may have a single MPEG4 based system for SD and HD, while countries with more established system may use MPEG2 for SD and MPEG4 for HD. There are also variations in middleware used. For example, Italy, Ireland and the UK are all DVB-T regions, but Ireland uses "MPEG4 + MHEG5 + DVB-T" for both SD and HD transmissions, while the UK uses "MPEG2 + MHEG5 + DVB-T" for SD and "MPEG4 + MHEG5 + DVB-T2" for HDTV, and Italy uses MHP rather than MHEG5 middleware. Since all MPEG4-capable receivers can decode the MPEG2 codec and all DVB-T2 tuners are capable of tuning DVB-T signals, UK HD set-top boxes are compatible with both the UK SD system and Irish SD/HD system, but Irish SD/HD tuners will only work with the SD system used in the UK. Digital cable broadcast tends to be DVB-C or very similar QAM in almost all countries. Broadband on cable is mostly DOCSIS which is DVB-C on the download path. This is important when buying a TV or set-box online rather than from a local retailer who would normally only stock the compatible system. Incompatible retail products are a severe problem in emerging retail digital markets where a neighbouring country has an older standard and dominates the retail trade, such as UK Freeview (rather than compatible "Freeview HD") products in Ireland. Important DVB-T standards are UK

D-book The D-Book is the UK technical specification for digital terrestrial television (DTT). The Digital TV Group (DTG) has published and maintained the D-Book for over a decade and the specification is updated annually to keep up with the pace of dev ...

for UK

Freeview Freeview may refer to: * Freeview (Australia), the marketing name for the digital terrestrial television platform in Australia * Freeview (New Zealand), a digital satellite and digital terrestrial television platform in New Zealand *Freeview (UK), ...

and Nordig 2.2 for Scandinavia and Ireland. Ireland deviates from Nordig by using UK profile MHEG5 middleware rather than MHP.

Africa

Botswana

ISDB-T International ISDB-T International, or SBTVD, short for Sistema Brasileiro de Televisão Digital ( en, Brazilian Digital Television System), is a technical standard for digital television broadcast used in Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Botswana, Chile, Honduras, Ve ...

is adopted as the first country in Africa on February 26, 2013, evaluated the hierarchical mode of operation, which allows for the simultaneous transmission to fixed, mobile and portable receivers from a single transmitter, advantageous over

DVB-T2 DVB-T2 is an abbreviation for "Digital Video Broadcasting – Second Generation Terrestrial"; it is the extension of the television standard DVB-T, issued by the consortium DVB, devised for the broadcast transmission of digital terrestrial tele ...

. Broadcasting in digital drives to transform Botswana into an E-Society.

Mozambique

The earliest form of digital television in

Mozambique Mozambique (), officially the Republic of Mozambique ( pt, Moçambique or , ; ny, Mozambiki; sw, Msumbiji; ts, Muzambhiki), is a country located in southeastern Africa bordered by the Indian Ocean to the east, Tanzania to the north, Malawi ...

began in 1996 with Southern African pay-TV operator

DStv Digital Satellite Television, commonly abbreviated to DStv, is a Sub-Saharan African direct broadcast satellite service owned by MultiChoice and based in Randburg, South Africa. Launched on 6 October 1995, the service provides multiple audio, ...

. Channels were transmitted and received via satellites and digital decoders. Some years later, TVCabo, began transmitting at first through analog and later digital means using decoders and an extensive fiber optic network. On January 18, Mozambique's Ministry of Transport and Communications announced that the country would be adopting the

system for transmission of terrestrial television channels. The implementation is expected to be completed by 2015.

Morocco

National Television Company in

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to ...

started

based digital TV deployment in February 2007. Digital TV is now available in the following cities and their regions: Casablanca, Benslimane, Settat, Nouaceur, Mediouna, Mohammedia, Rabat, Salé, Skhirat-Temara, Kenitra, Sidi Kacem, Khemisset, Meknes, Fes, Oujda, Tanger and Marrakech.

Namibia

While

Namibia Namibia (, ), officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in Southern Africa. Its western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and ea ...

's public broadcasters still rely on analogue transmission and have not announced a transition date to digital television, the

pay-TV Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, but ...

operator

MultiChoice MultiChoice is a South African company that operates DStv, a major satellite television service in Sub-Saharan Africa and GOtv, a minor service operating in over 9 countries of this area and Showmax service. MultiChoice was formed out of the sub ...

already operates a digital television service using the

standard.

South Africa

The first digital television implementation in

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

was a satellite-based system launched by pay-TV operator

in 1995. On 22 February 2007 the South African government announced that the country's public TV operators would be broadcasting in digital by 1 November 2008, followed by a three-year dual-illumination period which would end on 1 November 2011. The government in January 2011 announced a change in its choice of technology from DVB-T to DVB-T2 with the analog switch off date postponed to December 2013. The rollout of digital television has been further delayed until 2017, 2021.

Egypt

In 2020 to 2021, for the first time in Africa, HD demonstration content was received via satellite without the need for a separate external receiver or decoder. At the 2021 Industry Day's conference in Egypt, Cairo broadcast quality HD content (with a resolution of pixels at 50FPS) was encoded using AVS encoder (at a bit rate of ).

Asia

Afghanistan

The

Oqaab Oqaab ( fa, عقاب, meaning "eagle") is the national digital terrestrial television (DTT) service in Afghanistan, operated by the privately owned Afghanistan Broadcasting System (ABS). The service rolled out in April 2015 starting in Kabul and h ...

service using DVB-T2 was launched in 2015.

Cambodia

A digital television trial was completed on November 9, 2000 – May 31, 2001 and was officially launched on November 9, 2010, by TV5. Analog switch-off will be 2015–2020. As of 2017,

Phnom Penh Cable Television Phnom Penh Cable Television, also known as PPCTV, is a cable TV subscription service established by Phnom Penh Municipal Cable Television (PPCTV). It is one of the major cable TV services in Cambodia with the largest number of viewers concentrat ...

and One TV offer encrypted DVB-T2 pay TV services, viewable only with a subscription and set top box with card. In Phnom Penh, the following channels are available free to air: S Movie, SREPLAY (ETV), S Cinema, Nice TV, Fox Sports, Fox Action Movies, ARY Musik, CGTN Documentary, YTN World, SanSha TV, OneTV Sabay 1.

China

In June and September 2003, the State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television (SARFT) selected 41 experimental spots for digital television trials and launched the trials later before year end 2003. Later, according to the Tenth Five Year Plan and 2010 long-range plan for radio, film and television, SARFT drafted a switch-off timetable for different levels of Chinese cities, towns and counties, in which it was commanded that by 2010 digital broadcasting be implemented overall and by 2015 analog televisions be phased out completely. It was estimated that by year end 2007, China would have over 27 million digital TV users. In 2004, debates arose about whether the digital television technology by

Tsinghua University Tsinghua University (; abbreviation, abbr. THU) is a National university, national Public university, public research university in Beijing, China. The university is funded by the Ministry of Education of the People's Republic of China, Minis ...

Shanghai Jiao Tong University Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU; ) is a public research university in Shanghai, China. The university is funded by the Ministry of Education of China. The university was established on April 8, 1896 as Nanyang Public School (南洋� ...

should be adopted as the national standards. Finally, in late July 2007, China announced the final version of standards as a combined one and Tsinghua succeeded in this battle as 95% of its technology has been adopted. On September 1, 2005, the first

HDTV High-definition television (HD or HDTV) describes a television system which provides a substantially higher image resolution than the previous generation of technologies. The term has been used since 1936; in more recent times, it refers to the g ...

channel in China, which would be broadcast nationwide later, began to air in

Hangzhou Hangzhou ( or , ; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ), also romanized as Hangchow, is the capital and most populous city of Zhejiang, China. It is located in the northwestern part of the province, sitting at the head of Hangzhou Bay, whi ...

Hong Kong

On December 31, 2007, local broadcasters started to air HDTV (1920X1080i) using Chinese

standard. Currently, there are 12 HD channels airing 24 hours daily. Hong Kong broadcasters are keen to use whichever standard

China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

adopts, since doing so would allow them to transmit into the lucrative market in Southern China, and would lessen the need for costly format conversion.

India

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

there are over 600 Satellite television channels that are being broadcast as of 2012. India has adopted DVB-T system for digital television in July 1999. The first DVB-T transmission was started on 26 January 2003 in the four major metropolitan cities by Doordarshan. Currently the terrestrial transmission is available in both digital and analog formats. The Cable Digitalisation Act mandates all cable television networks to turnoff analogue transmission and switch to digital transmission by 31 March 2015. The digital transition is planned over four phases in the country. The first analogue transmission cutoff date is set to 1 November 2012, for the four major metropolitan cities (New Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Chennai). The Second analogue transmission cutoff date is 31 March 2013 for Patna, Chandigarh, Pune and Bengaluru. The third analogue transmission cutoff date is 30 November 2014 for all urban areas including state capitals. The analogue transmission cut off date for all other cities in the country is set for 31 March 2015. The switchover was completed in December 2016. Digital television is also available through Direct To Home service. These services are provided using locally built satellites from ISRO such as INSAT 4CR, INSAT 4A, INSAT-2E, INSAT-3C and INSAT-3E as well as private satellites such as the Dutch-based SES, Global-owned NSS 6, Thaicom-2 and Telstar 10. India currently has seven major DTH service providers and a total of over 23 million subscriber households in 2010. These are Dish TV (a ZEE TV subsidiary), Tata Sky, Sun Network owned 'Sundirect DTH', Reliance owned BIG TV, Bharti Airtel's DTH Service 'Airtel Digital TV' and the public sector DD Direct Plus. As of 2010, India has the most competitive Direct-broadcast satellite market with seven operators vying for more than 110 million TV homes. India overtook USA as the world's largest Direct-broadcast satellite market in 2012.

Indonesia

Indonesia began experimenting with digital TV broadcasting in 2008. In January 2014, the Supreme Court annulled the decisions of the Communication and Information Technology Regulation, removing requirements for an analog shut-off and allowing local analogue broadcasters to rent back channels allocated to digital broadcasting. From August 2014, UHF DVB-T2 equipment has been available for public purchase.

Iran

Iran started the transition to digital TV broadcasting in 2009 using DVB-T MPEG-4 standard. Iran plans to completely switch over to digital TV by 2015. As of summer of 2011, Iranian digital TV broadcast covered 40% of Iran's population.

Israel

The

Knesset The Knesset ( he, הַכְּנֶסֶת ; "gathering" or "assembly") is the unicameral legislature of Israel. As the supreme state body, the Knesset is sovereign and thus has complete control of the entirety of the Israeli government (with ...

approved the law regarding DTT in late 2007.

The Second Authority for Television and Radio The Second Authority for Television and Radio ( he, הרשות השניה לטלויזיה ורדיו, ''HaRashut HaShniya Le'Televizya VeRadio'') is an Israeli commercial television and radio authority, established in the wake of a law passed by ...

is responsible for the deployment of the system - the project name is "Idan+". The package consists of 6 channels: IBA1, IBA33, Channel 2, Channel 10, Channel 23 (

Israeli Educational Television The Israeli Educational Television (also known as IETV, he, הטלוויזיה החינוכית הישראלית, ''HaŦelevizia HaKhinuchít HaIsraelit'' or just ''חינוכית'' - ''Hinuchit'') was a state-owned public terrestrial televisio ...

) and The Knesset Channel. DVB-T broadcasts using the MPEG-4 Part 10, H.264 (AVC) video and HE AAC+ V2 audio codecs were launched in mid-2009. There were proceedings in the Knesset to add local music channel 24 to the system as well. Full technical details along with a map of the country showing transmitter locations can be found her

and her

Additional channels will be added using the DVB-T2 standard already testing since 2014 in central Israel, showing mainly IBA-TV1 HD channel and various tests in Dolby Digital.

Japan

Japan pioneered

with an analog implementation. The old system is not compatible with the new digital standards. Japanese Terrestrial television, terrestrial broadcasting of HD via

ISDB-T Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting (ISDB; Japanese: , ''Tōgō dejitaru hōsō sābisu'') is a Japanese broadcasting standard for digital television (DTV) and digital radio. ISDB supersedes both the NTSC-J analog television system and th ...

started on December 1, 2003, in the Tokyo,

Osaka is a designated city in the Kansai region of Honshu in Japan. It is the capital of and most populous city in Osaka Prefecture, and the third most populous city in Japan, following Special wards of Tokyo and Yokohama. With a population of 2. ...

, and

Nagoya is the largest city in the Chūbu region, the fourth-most populous city and third most populous urban area in Japan, with a population of 2.3million in 2020. Located on the Pacific coast in central Honshu, it is the capital and the most pop ...

metropolitan areas of Japan, and expanded to the outer areas before September 30, 2007. It has been reported that 31 million HD receivers have been sold in Japan as of January 2008. The Japanese government is studying the implementation of some improvements on the standard as suggested by Brazilian researchers (

SBTVD ISDB-T International, or SBTVD, short for Sistema Brasileiro de Televisão Digital ( en, Brazilian Digital Television System), is a technical standard for digital television broadcast used in Brazil, Argentina, Peru, Botswana, Chile, Honduras, Ve ...

). These new features are unlikely to be adopted in Japan due to incompatibility problems, but are being considered for use in future implementations in other countries, including Brazil itself. The move to DTV by consumers is relatively slow, partly because high-definition televisions are very expensive. Additionally, there have been issues with the

B-CAS B-CAS (BS Conditional Access Systems Co., Ltd.) is a vendor and operator of the ISDB CAS system in Japan, largely owned by the public broadcaster NHK with some other electronics companies and broadcasters airing in BSAT. It also refers to the rec ...

system and

Digital Rights Management Digital rights management (DRM) is the management of legal access to digital content. Various tools or technological protection measures (TPM) such as access control technologies can restrict the use of proprietary hardware and copyrighted works. ...

in respect to the home recording of broadcasts. On December 20, 2007, the Japanese electronics industry association set the rule (of copy control) for DTT broadcasting that allows consumers up 10 times more

dubbing Dubbing (re-recording and mixing) is a post-production process used in filmmaking and video production, often in concert with sound design, in which additional or supplementary recordings are lip-synced and "mixed" with original production sou ...

of entire TV program with video and audio into

DVD recorder A DVD recorder is an optical disc recorder that uses optical disc recording technologies to digitally record analog or digital signals onto blank writable DVD media. Such devices are available as either installable drives for computers or a ...

, etc. by way of a new program called . Dubbing 10 was planned to start on June 2, 2008, but it was postponed A settlement with the

Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers The , often referred to as JASRAC, is a Japanese copyright collection society. It was founded in 1939 as a nonprofit organization, and is the largest musical copyright administration society in Japan. Overview JASRAC's main business activity i ...

was reached on June 15, and it was later confirmed on June 24 that the Dubbing 10 program will start on July 4, 2008. The manufacturers for the DVD and associated DTT recorders will make the units conform to the "Dubbing 10" rule and some manufacturers might release the downloading subprograms to update the recorder's internal software for existing users. On April 3, 2008, DPA (The Association for Promotion of Digital Broadcasting-Japan) announced that there has been a total 32.71 million of DTT (

) receiving

television Television, sometimes shortened to TV, is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. The term can refer to a television set, or the medium of television transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertisin ...

sets (except

1seg is a mobile terrestrial digital audio/video and data broadcasting service in Japan, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay, Peru and the Philippines. Service began experimentally during 2005 and commercially on April 1, 2006. It is designed ...

receivers) installed in Japan as of end of March 2008. DPA also announced the guideline documentation to manufacturers who make the DTT receiver, recorder and replay units to operate with the

personal computer A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or tec ...

on April 8, 2008. This add-on unit operates on

USB Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard that establishes specifications for cables, connectors and protocols for connection, communication and power supply (interfacing) between computers, peripherals and other computers. A broad ...

PCI PCI may refer to: Business and economics * Payment card industry, businesses associated with debit, credit, and other payment cards ** Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, a set of security requirements for credit card processors * Pro ...

BUS A bus (contracted from omnibus, with variants multibus, motorbus, autobus, etc.) is a road vehicle that carries significantly more passengers than an average car or van. It is most commonly used in public transport, but is also in use for cha ...

, and went on sale in May 2008. From January 22 to January 24, 2010, analog television broadcasting was suspended for 48 hours as part of a

rehearsal A rehearsal is an activity in the performing arts that occurs as preparation for a performance in music, theatre, dance and related arts, such as opera, musical theatre and film production. It is undertaken as a form of practising, to ensure t ...

to approximately 7,000 homes in Suzu and parts of

Noto Noto ( scn, Notu; la, Netum) is a city and in the Province of Syracuse, Sicily, Italy. It is southwest of the city of Syracuse at the foot of the Iblean Mountains. It lends its name to the surrounding area Val di Noto. In 2002 Noto and i ...

. On September 24, 2010, at noon, analog TV transmissions officially ended in Suzu and parts of Noto (approximately 8,800 homes) as part of the rehearsal plan that took place one year ahead of the nationwide shutdown, which was scheduled to start on July 24, 2011. Though this analog broadcasting shutdown was isolated to a small, rural area, it was the first complete analog shutdown in

Asia Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an area ...

outside of Israel. On April 20, 2011, the

Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications The is a cabinet-level ministry in the Government of Japan. Its English name was Ministry of Public Management, Home Affairs, Posts and Telecommunications (MPHPT) prior to 2004. It is housed in the 2nd Building of the Central Common Government Of ...

confirmed that the analog terrestrial TV service will shut down on July 24 in 44 of the 47 prefectures. The three prefectures of Iwate,

Miyagi Miyagi may refer to: Places * Miyagi Prefecture, one of the 47 major divisions of Japan * Miyagi, Gunma, a village in Japan, merged into Maebashi in 2004 *Miyagi District, Miyagi, a district in Miyagi Prefecture, Japan Other uses * Miyagi (surna ...

and

Fukushima may refer to: Japan * Fukushima Prefecture, Japanese prefecture ** Fukushima, Fukushima, capital city of Fukushima Prefecture, Japan ***Fukushima University, national university in Japan *** Fukushima Station (Fukushima) in Fukushima, Fukushim ...

were heavily damaged by the 9.0 magnitude earthquake and its related nuclear accidents, and as a result, television stations in those three prefectures shut down their analog signals nine months later on March 31, 2012.

South Korea (Republic of Korea)

After a long controversy between the government and broadcasters in

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

was chosen over

. Since 2005, digital services have been available across the entire country. South Korea also developed its own mobile TV standard called DMB, Digital Multimedia Broadcasting, based on the European technology af Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB). It has a satellite, subscription-based, version (S-DMB), and a free, terrestrial version (T-DMB). T-DMB encountered a wide success, both in South Korea and abroad. For more details see Digital Multimedia Broadcasting.

Malaysia

Malaysia started DVB-T tests in 2006, and the first DTTB services were rolled out in a few areas of the country in January 2014. On 6 June 2017, digital television officially launched in the country with the launch of

MYTV Broadcasting MYTV Broadcasting or MYTV is a Malaysian television broadcasting company providing free digital terrestrial television (DTT) in the country, considered a first of its kind in the country. The DTT service is officially branded as myFreeview sinc ...

. Nine channels are being broadcast on the service, including: TV1, TV2, TV3, NTV7, 8TV, TV9, TVi,

TV Alhijrah TV AlHijrah is a state-owned Malaysian free-to-air Islamic television channel, owned and operated by Al-Hijrah Media Corporation, a company under the purview of the Department of Islamic Development Malaysia of the Prime Minister's Department. ...

, and BNC News. Analogue broadcast is scheduled to be phasing out in stages by 3rd quarter of 2019.

Langkawi Langkawi, officially known by its sobriquet Langkawi, the Jewel of Kedah ( ms, Langkawi Permata Kedah ), is a duty-free island and an archipelago of 99 islands (plus five small islands visible only at low tide in the Strait of Malacca) locate ...

become the first area of analogue television switch off that were executed on 21 July at 02:30 AM (

UTC+8 UTC+08:00 is an identifier for a time offset from UTC of +08:00. With an estimated population of 1.708 billion living within the time zone, roughly 24% of the world population, it is the most populous time zone in the world, as well as a ...

). Further on 6 August, the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Ministry released a complete list of transition date on the remaining areas with central and southern

West Malaysia Peninsular Malaysia ( ms, Semenanjung Malaysia; Jawi: سمننجڠ مليسيا), or the States of Malaya ( ms, Negeri-negeri Tanah Melayu; Jawi: نڬري-نڬري تانه ملايو), also known as West Malaysia or the Malaysian Peninsula, ...

to be commenced on 19 August, northern West Malaysia on 2 September, eastern coast West Malaysia on 17 September and entire

East Malaysia East Malaysia (), or the Borneo States, also known as Malaysian Borneo, is the part of Malaysia on and near the island of Borneo, the world's third-largest island. Near the coast of Sabah is a small archipelago called Labuan. East Malaysia li ...

on 30 September. The switch over in West Malaysia are fully completed on 16 October at 12:30 AM (UTC+8), while the final switch over in East Malaysia are completed on 31 October also at 12:30 AM (UTC+8) as scheduled. Satellite *

Astro Astro may refer to: Entertainment and media * Astro (South Korean band), a South Korean boy band * Astro (UB40) (1957–2021), member of the British reggae band UB40 * Astro (Chilean band), a Chilean indie rock band * Astro (Japanese band), ...

(DVB-S over Ku-Band) **

Astro B.yond Astro B.yond is a Malaysian first high-definition television (HDTV) service from Astro. Launched by Astro on 11 December 2009. The roll out of these services is estimated to cost some RM200 million, including marketing and operating costs of appro ...

(DVB-S over Ku-Band and DVB-S2 over Ka-Band) **

Astro NJOI NJOI is a Malaysian free-to-view satellite television service launched on 18 February 2012 in collaboration with the government of Malaysia and Astro. It was officially announced by former Prime Minister of Malaysia, Najib Razak on 20 December ...

(DVB-S over Ku-Band and DVB-S2 over Ka-Band) Cable * ABN Xcess (DVB-C, coaxial cable) IPTV *

Unifi TV Unifi TV (stylized as unifi tv, formerly known as HyppTV prior to January 2018) is an IPTV service operated by Telekom Malaysia (TM). It was launched in 2010 as part of TM's bundled Triple-play service offering of VoIP Telephone, Internet and ...

(DVB-IPTV, Fiber, VLAN 600) *

Astro IPTV Astro IPTV is an Internet Protocol Television service by the Malaysian satellite television provider, Astro. Launched on 20 April 2011 as Astro B.yond IPTV, its subscribers were entitled to high definition Astro channels, personal video recording ...

(DVB-IPTV, Fiber, VLAN 612) * DETV (DVB-IPTV, open Internet)

Pakistan

Digital television has been launched in Pakistan with Chinese assistance as part of the

China–Pakistan Economic Corridor China–Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) (; ur, چین پاکستان اقتصادی راہداری) is a collection of infrastructure projects that are under construction throughout Pakistan beginning in 2013. Originally valued at $47 billi ...

On April 20, 2015, Prime Minister

Nawaz Sharif Mian Muhammad Nawaz Sharif (Urdu, Punjabi language, Punjabi: ; born 25 December 1949) is a Pakistani businessman and politician who has served as the Prime Minister of Pakistan for three non-consecutive terms. He is the longest-serving prime ...

and Chinese President

Xi Jinping Xi Jinping ( ; ; ; born 15 June 1953) is a Chinese politician who has served as the general secretary of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and chairman of the Central Military Commission (CMC), and thus as the paramount leader of China, s ...

implemented a number of agreements between the two very friendly countries which included Pakistani adoption of the

Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcast DTMB (Digital Terrestrial Multimedia Broadcast) is the digital TV standard for mobile and fixed devices, developed in the People's Republic of China. It is used there and in both of their special administrative regions (Hong Kong and Macau), and ...

Chinese standard. The Pakistani side had previously evaluated the other competing digital standards including the European DVB-T and Japanese ISDB-T before rejecting them infavour of the Chinese technology which extremely impressed the Pakistani government.

ZTE ZTE Corporation is a Chinese partially state-owned technology company that specializes in telecommunication. Founded in 1985, ZTE is listed on both the Hong Kong and Shenzhen Stock Exchanges. ZTE's core business is wireless, exchange, opt ...

. a Chinese telecommunications giant. was selected by the Chinese government to roll out digital television services in

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...

. this will also include staff training and content creation including partnerships with Chinese multinational companies in multiple areas including television sets and set top boxes as a form of "International Cooperation". The Chinese presence in Pakistan's digital landscape has been increasing in recent years and the DTMB adoption by Pakistan and the increasing Chinese information and telecommunications technology in Pakistan is part of the wider

Belt and Road Initiative The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI, or B&R), formerly known as One Belt One Road ( zh, link=no, 一带一路) or OBOR for short, is a global infrastructure development strategy adopted by the Chinese government in 2013 to invest in nearly 150 ...

with the goal to great a "Digital Silk Road" in

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

and

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

Philippines

Digital television transition in the Philippines started its planning stage in 2006 after the

National Telecommunications Commission The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC; fil, Pambansang Komisyon sa Telekomunikasyon) is an attached agency of the Department of Information and Communications Technology responsible for the supervision, adjudication and control over ...

released a memorandum on what DTV broadcast standard was to be adopted for the country. The commission decided to have UHF TV channels 14–51 at frequency spectrum 470-698

MHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose expression in terms of SI base units is s−1, meaning that one he ...

given over to digital broadcast. The commission opted not to choose the

standard, although the Philippines uses the

NTSC-M The first American standard for analog television broadcast was developed by National Television System Committee (NTSC)National Television System Committee (1951–1953), Report and Reports of Panel No. 11, 11-A, 12–19, with Some supplement ...

standard. Instead the country started test trials of two different standards, those being the

DVB Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) is a set of international open standards for digital television. DVB standards are maintained by the DVB Project, an international industry consortium, and are published by a Joint Technical Committee (JTC) o ...

of Europe and ISDB of Japan. Many broadcasters agreed to adopt the Japanese

but some opted for the European DVB. On June 11, 2010, the National Telecommunications Commission of the Philippines announced that the country would adopt the

standard. The first fully operational digital TV channel in the country is GEM-TV49 of the religious group Iglesia ni Cristo. While the Japanese ISDB-T standard was adopted for terrestrial digital TV transmission, digital cable and satellite TV providers in the Philippines such as

SkyCable Sky Cable (stylized as SKYcable) is a cable television service of Sky Cable Corporation in the Philippines. It covers areas across the country with both digital and analog cable services, and it has 700,000 subscribers, controlling 45% of t ...

and

Cignal Cignal (pronounced as ''signal'') is a Philippine satellite television and IPTV provider, owned by Cignal TV Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of the MediaQuest Holdings Inc. under the PLDT Beneficial Trust Fund. Cignal's prepaid electronic ...

use the European

system for service distribution to carry some channels based in

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

, and

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

(which are using DVB) through country-specific feed of them. An internet user had created an online petition urging NTC to adopt

ATSC 3.0 ATSC 3.0 is a major version of the ATSC standards for television broadcasting created by the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC). The standards are designed to offer support for newer technologies, including HEVC for video channels of u ...

together with or replace the currently existing ISDB-T.

Saudi Arabia

The first phase of digital terrestrial television (DTT) transmission in

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in Western Asia. It covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula, and has a land area of about , making it the fifth-largest country in Asia, the second-largest in the A ...

was launched on the 11 June 2006 in the main cities of

Riyadh Riyadh (, ar, الرياض, 'ar-Riyāḍ, lit.: 'The Gardens' Najdi pronunciation: ), formerly known as Hajr al-Yamamah, is the capital and largest city of Saudi Arabia. It is also the capital of the Riyadh Province and the centre of the R ...

Jeddah Jeddah ( ), also spelled Jedda, Jiddah or Jidda ( ; ar, , Jidda, ), is a city in the Hejaz region of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) and the country's commercial center. Established in the 6th century BC as a fishing village, Jeddah's pro ...

and

Dammam Dammam ( ar, الدمّام ') is the fifth-most populous city in Saudi Arabia after Riyadh, Jeddah, Mecca, and Medina. It is the capital of the Eastern Province. With a total population of 1,252,523 as of 2020. The judicial and administrative ...

, the

ArabNews ''Arab News'' is an English-language daily newspaper published in Saudi Arabia. It is published from Riyadh. The target audiences of the paper, which is published in broadsheet format, are businessmen, executives and diplomats. At least as of ...

reports. Assistant Deputy Minister of Culture and Information for Engineering Affairs, Riyadh Najm, said: "The southern city of

Abha Abha ( ar, أَبْهَا, ') is the capital of 'Asir Region in Saudi Arabia, with a population of 1,093,705 as of 2021. It is situated above sea level in the fertile Asir Mountains of south-western Saudi Arabia, near Asir National Park. Abha' ...

and the central city of

Buraidah Buraidah ( ar, بريدة ') is the capital and largest city of Al-Qassim Region in north-central Saudi Arabia in the heart of the Arabian Peninsula. Buraydah lies equidistant from the Red Sea to the west and Persian Gulf to the east. Its known fo ...

will also have the facility within this month." He added, "By February next year (20??) the DTT system will cover not less than 23 cities and that accounts for more than 70 percent of the population". He also said the DTT technology would allow people to receive all the four Saudi channels (Channel One, Channel Two, Arriyadiah and

Al Ekhbariya Al Ekhbariya ( ar, الإخبارية) is an Arabic news and current affairs satellite TV channel based in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. History Launched on 11 January 2004, its aim according to its director was to present "a new image of the Gulf Ara ...

) as well as the Saudi radio programmes (General Programme, Radio Qur’an, Second Programme and European Programme) with better clarity.

Kuwait

DVB-T2 modern technology for broadcasting TV channels within the borders of the state of Kuwait and broadcasts are received through receivers (receivers) that are connected to television sets if the devices are not supported by this technology. the channels covered by digital terrestrial TV broadcasting? Kuwait State TV package as follows: - The first - The second - Sports - Sports Plus - Enrichment - Arabi - the Council - Spouse - Stay home Most countries of the world have the technology of digital terrestrial television broadcasting. https://www.media.gov.kw/DVBT2.aspx

Singapore

Singapore's digital TV (DTV) journey started in 2012 when it was announced that the nation's free-to-air TV channels will go fully digital using the DVB-T2 (Digital Video Broadcasting – Second Generation Terrestrial) broadcasting standard. Since December 2013, all seven Mediacorp channels have been broadcast in digital. On 6 November 2017, MDA announced that analogue television would cease to broadcast entirely by the end of 2018, up from the intended 19 February 2018, to facilitate more time for majority of Singaporeans to switch to DTV as soon as possible. The analogue broadcast was finally ceased on 2 January 2019. The adoption of the DVB-T2 standard was decided after a successful trial that was conducted with free-to-air broadcaster Mediacorp. The trial, which involved some 500 households in Ang Mo Kio and Bedok estates, showed that DVB-T2 was suitable for deployment in Singapore's urbanised environment. DVB-T2 also offers higher efficiency, robustness and flexibility, enabling efficient use of valuable terrestrial spectrum for the delivery of audio, video and data services to fixed, portable and mobile devices.

Sri Lanka

The first Television network of

Sri Lanka Sri Lanka (, ; si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා, Śrī Laṅkā, translit-std=ISO (); ta, இலங்கை, Ilaṅkai, translit-std=ISO ()), formerly known as Ceylon and officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka, is an ...

was launched on 13 April 1979. The

ITN channel Independent Television Network Ltd ( si, ස්වාධීන රූපවාහිනී මාධ්‍ය ජාලය; ta, சுயாதீன தொலைக்காட்சி ஊடக வளையமைப்பு) also known a ...

, owned by the

Independent Television Network Limited Independent Television Network Ltd ( si, ස්වාධීන රූපවාහිනී මාධ්‍ය ජාලය; ta, சுயாதீன தொலைக்காட்சி ஊடக வளையமைப்பு) also known a ...

(ITN) became the first terrestrial television channel of Sri Lanka. On June 5, 1979, ITN was converted to a government-owned business and was later brought under the Sri Lanka Rupavahini Act of 1982 along with the newly created Sri Lanka Rupavahini Corporation (SLRC). Significant changes occurred in 1992 as the government permitted the establishment of private television networks. Subsequently, the

MTV Channel MTV Channel (Pvt) Ltd is a Sri Lankan media company which owns three national television channels - Shakthi TV, Sirasa TV and TV 1. It also owns the Hit TV, News First and Ethalaya.com. The company was established in 1992 as joint venture between ...

network was launched in collaboration with

Singapore Telecommunications Limited Singapore Telecommunications Limited, commonly known as Singtel, is a Singaporean telecommunications conglomerate and one of the four major telcos operating in the country. The company is the List of mobile network operators of the Asia Pacifi ...

(Singtel).
Since then many new television networks have come into existence within Sri Lanka. There are also a number of Satellite networks and pay per view television networks in Sri Lanka. The national telecommunications provider,

Sri Lanka Telecom SLT-MOBITEL (formerly known as Sri Lanka Telecom, si, ශ්‍රී ලංකා ටෙලිකොම්, Śrī Laṃkā Ṭelikom, ta, ஸ்ரீலங்கா டெலிகொம்) is the national telecommunications services provide ...

also launched an IPTV service in 2008. MTV Channel had introduced Sri Lanka's first 24-hour Television channel,"Sirasa TV" on the 2009 as a thought to satisfy the thoughts of the public to analyse the ongoing global affairs.

Taiwan

Digital television launched terrestrially in

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

on July 2, 2004. Currently, there are

simulcast Simulcast (a portmanteau of simultaneous broadcast) is the broadcasting of programmes/programs or events across more than one resolution, bitrate or medium, or more than one service on the same medium, at exactly the same time (that is, simultane ...

s of analogue and digital television. Taiwan plans to replace an American analogue broadcasting system

NTSC The first American standard for analog television broadcast was developed by National Television System Committee (NTSC)National Television System Committee (1951–1953), Report and Reports of Panel No. 11, 11-A, 12–19, with Some supplement ...

with a European digital TV system

by 2012 using 6 MHz channel bandwidth just like in

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

Panama Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Cos ...

, and

Trinidad and Tobago Trinidad and Tobago (, ), officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, is the southernmost island country in the Caribbean. Consisting of the main islands Trinidad and Tobago, and numerous much smaller islands, it is situated south of ...

. To assist lower-income families with the switch to digital television, the government plans to provide NT$300 million in aid to purchase converters or for the purchase of new digital televisions.

Thailand

The first digital television service in

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

was launched by satellite based pay-TV operator

IBC IBC is an initialism that can stand for: Broadcasting *Intercontinental Broadcasting Corporation, Channel 13, Philippines * International Beacon Project, Worldwide network of radio propagation beacons *International Broadcast Centre *International ...

in 1996 using the DVB-S system. Starting from December 2000, the Thai national broadcaster

Modernine TV MCOT HD (in Thailand called Channel 9 MCOT HD th, ช่อง 9 เอ็มคอตเอชดี) is a Thai free-to-air television network launched on 24 June 1955 and owned by MCOT. History The channel was originally launched as Chan ...

began its trial Digital Terrestrial Digital Television (DDTV) service for six months to 2000 selected households in the capital city of

Bangkok Bangkok, officially known in Thai language, Thai as Krung Thep Maha Nakhon and colloquially as Krung Thep, is the capital and most populous city of Thailand. The city occupies in the Chao Phraya River delta in central Thailand and has an estima ...

and surrounding areas on UHF Band 658 MHz and 674 MHz (or Channel 44 and 46) using the DVB-T standard. The trial DDTV service will of current "current" 2 analogue TV channels (i.e.

and TV3) in digital, and 2 new digital-only channels, namely MCOT 1 and

ASEAN TV ASEAN ( , ), officially the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, is a Political union, political and economic union of 10 member Sovereign state, states in Southeast Asia, which promotes intergovernmental organization, intergovernmental coo ...

. Also provided under the service are seven

FM radio FM broadcasting is a method of radio broadcasting using frequency modulation (FM). Invented in 1933 by American engineer Edwin Armstrong, wide-band FM is used worldwide to provide high fidelity sound over broadcast radio. FM broadcasting is cap ...

stations in

digital audio Digital audio is a representation of sound recorded in, or converted into, digital form. In digital audio, the sound wave of the audio signal is typically encoded as numerical samples in a continuous sequence. For example, in CD audio, sa ...

and

interactive Across the many fields concerned with interactivity, including information science, computer science, human-computer interaction, communication, and industrial design, there is little agreement over the meaning of the term "interactivity", but mo ...

services. Nationwide implementation is planned to begin by the year 2007 or 2008, although as of August 2008 digital transmission is still only available in the

Bangkok Metropolitan Area The Bangkok Metropolitan Region (BMR) ( th, กรุงเทพมหานครและปริมณฑล; ; ), may refer to a government-defined "political definition" of the urban region surrounding the metropolis of Bangkok, or the built ...

and possibly deferred. Even though MCOT's trial was a success, the future of the digital terrestrial television transition has become uncertain, especially after the end of

Somchai Wongsawat Somchai Wongsawat ( th, สมชาย วงศ์สวัสดิ์, ; born 31 August 1947) is a Thai politician who was the prime minister of Thailand in 2008 and a former executive member of the People's Power Party (Thailand), People ...

's tenure as the

prime minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...

and the beginning of successor Abhisit Vejjajiva. All the above digital television services are in standard definition and MCOT would have initiated HDTV trials by 2009.

Vietnam

Vietnam tested DVB-T in 2003 from a national school in

Ho Chi Minh City , population_density_km2 = 4,292 , population_density_metro_km2 = 697.2 , population_demonym = Saigonese , blank_name = GRP (Nominal) , blank_info = 2019 , blank1_name = – Total , blank1_ ...

. A DVB-T channel is launching in 2001 by VTC Digital. DVBT2 was launched in 2011 in Vietnam by AVG - Audio Video Global JSC, now is MobiTV by Mobifone - Vietnam Mobile Telecom Services (from 26/2/2016). Analogue signals switched off on 01/11/2015 in Da Nang, Vietnam. Da Nang is the first city in Asean has launched analogue switch off successfully.

Oceania

Australia

Digital Satellite

There are many digital satellite TV services in Australia, these are,

Foxtel Foxtel is an Australian pay television company—operating in cable television, direct broadcast satellite television, and IPTV streaming services. It was formed in April 2018, superseding an earlier company from 1995. The service was establi ...

Austar Austar was an Australian telecommunications company. Its main business activity was subscription television but it has also been involved with internet access and mobile phones. It was founded in 1995 under the name Community Entertainment Tele ...

, Selectv,

Optus Singtel Optus Pty Limited (commonly referred to as Optus) is an Australian Telecommunications in Australia, telecommunications company headquartered in Macquarie Park, New South Wales, Australia. It is a wholly owned subsidiary of Singapore, Si ...

TransACT TransACT is the trading name of TransACT Capital Communications, an Australian telecommunications company based in Canberra which provides broadband internet access, fixed telephony, cable television services, and mobile phone services in Can ...

and

UBI World TV Subscription television in Australia is provided using technologies such as cable television, satellite television and internet television by a number of companies unified in their provision of a subscription television service. Notable actors in ...

. Digital satellite television is popular with

and

alone reaching over one quarter of the nation's population.

Digital Free-to-air

Digital terrestrial television in Australia commenced on 1 January 2001, in the country's five most populous cities, Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. Digital services using DVB-T standards are available nationwide. Analogue transmissions were phased out between mid-2010 and December 2013.

Digital Cable

Digital Cable operators in Australia are

Neighbourhood Cable A neighbourhood (British English, Irish English, Australian English and Canadian English) or neighborhood (American English; American and British English spelling differences, see spelling differences) is a geographically localised community ...

in some regional cities in Victoria, and

in Darwin. These services are available to the following cities:

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

Melbourne Melbourne ( ; Boonwurrung/Woiwurrung: ''Narrm'' or ''Naarm'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second-most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Its name generally refers to a met ...

Brisbane Brisbane ( ) is the capital and most populous city of the states and territories of Australia, Australian state of Queensland, and the list of cities in Australia by population, third-most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a populati ...

Adelaide Adelaide ( ) is the capital city of South Australia, the state's largest city and the fifth-most populous city in Australia. "Adelaide" may refer to either Greater Adelaide (including the Adelaide Hills) or the Adelaide city centre. The dem ...

Perth Perth is the capital and largest city of the Australian state of Western Australia. It is the fourth most populous city in Australia and Oceania, with a population of 2.1 million (80% of the state) living in Greater Perth in 2020. Perth is ...

Gold Coast Gold Coast may refer to: Places Africa * Gold Coast (region), in West Africa, which was made up of the following colonies, before being established as the independent nation of Ghana: ** Portuguese Gold Coast (Portuguese, 1482–1642) ** Dutch G ...

Canberra Canberra ( ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...

Hobart Hobart ( ; Nuennonne/Palawa kani: ''nipaluna'') is the capital and most populous city of the Australian island state of Tasmania. Home to almost half of all Tasmanians, it is the least-populated Australian state capital city, and second-small ...

Geelong Geelong ( ) (Wathawurrung: ''Djilang''/''Djalang'') is a port city in the southeastern Australian state of Victoria, located at the eastern end of Corio Bay (the smaller western portion of Port Phillip Bay) and the left bank of Barwon River, ...

Ballarat Ballarat ( ) is a city in the Central Highlands (Victoria), Central Highlands of Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia. At the 2021 Census, Ballarat had a population of 116,201, making it the third largest city in Victoria. Estimated resid ...

Bendigo Bendigo ( ) is a city in Victoria, Australia, located in the Bendigo Valley near the geographical centre of the state and approximately north-west of Melbourne, the state capital. As of 2019, Bendigo had an urban population of 100,991, makin ...

Albury Albury () is a major regional city in New South Wales, Australia. It is located on the Hume Highway and the northern side of the Murray River. Albury is the seat of local government for the council area which also bears the city's name – the ...

Wodonga Wodonga (Pallanganmiddang language, Waywurru: ''Wordonga'') is a city on the Victoria (Australia), Victorian side of the border with New South Wales, north-east of Melbourne, Australia. It is located wholly within the boundaries of the City of ...

Mildura Mildura is a regional city in north-west Victoria, Australia. Located on the Victorian side of the Murray River, Mildura had a population of 34,565 in 2021. When nearby Wentworth, Irymple, Nichols Point and Merbein are included, the area had ...

and Darwin.

Cook Islands

Digital Free to Air

On the Island of Aitutaki - ArauraTV & Radio Ltd have commenced broadcasting in the DVB-T2 format - leapfrogging the technology being used by most terrestrial broadcasters elsewhere in the Pacific. They are currently broadcasting 6 channels of content and this will increase to 8 channels before the end of 2021.

New Zealand

In New Zealand, there are several forms of broadcast digital television.

Sky The sky is an unobstructed view upward from the surface of the Earth. It includes the atmosphere and outer space. It may also be considered a place between the ground and outer space, thus distinct from outer space. In the field of astronomy, ...

's Pay TV satellite service (available nationwide), Freeview's free-to-air satellite service (available nationwide), Freeview's free-to-air terrestrial service and multiple IPTV service providers.

Satellite

Sky TV launched New Zealand's first nationwide digital Pay TV service in December 1998 and had a monopoly on digital satellite TV until the launch of Freeview's nationwide digital Satellite service in May 2007.

Terrestrial

The

terrestrial service is a high definition

digital terrestrial television Digital terrestrial television (DTTV or DTT, or DTTB with "broadcasting") is a technology for terrestrial television in which land-based (terrestrial) television stations broadcast television content by radio waves to televisions in consumers' ...

service using AVCHD, launched on April 14, 2008. The service currently serves 86 percent of the population - notable large towns without the service include Whakatane, Blenheim,

Oamaru Oamaru (; mi, Te Oha-a-Maru) is the largest town in North Otago, in the South Island of New Zealand, it is the main town in the Waitaki District. It is south of Timaru and north of Dunedin on the Pacific coast; State Highway 1 and the railway ...

and Queenstown.

Europe

Albania

Analogue terrestrial television in Albania is supposed to switch off in September 2019.

Albania Albania ( ; sq, Shqipëri or ), or , also or . officially the Republic of Albania ( sq, Republika e Shqipërisë), is a country in Southeastern Europe. It is located on the Adriatic and Ionian Seas within the Mediterranean Sea and shares ...

has three major forms of broadcast

. Terrestrial (

) using MPEG4, Cable ( DVB-C) using MPEG4 and MPEG2, and Satellite ( DVB-S). In addition multiple

IPTV Internet Protocol television (IPTV) is the delivery of television content over Internet Protocol (IP) networks. This is in contrast to delivery through traditional terrestrial, satellite, and cable television formats. Unlike downloaded media, ...

services are available.

Belgium

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

now has three major forms of broadcast

: Terrestrial (

DVB-H DVB-H (Digital Video Broadcasting - Handheld) is one of three prevalent mobile TV formats. It is a technical specification for bringing broadcast services to mobile handsets. DVB-H was formally adopted as ETSI standard EN 302 304 in November 20 ...

), Cable ( DVB-C), and Satellite ( DVB-S). In addition,

services are available. In Belgium, all the regions have completed the analog switchover (DVB-T).

Bulgaria

Croatia

Analogue terrestrial television was switched off in Croatia on 5 October 2010.

Croatian Radiotelevision ''Hrvatska radiotelevizija'' (abbr. HRT), or Croatian Radiotelevision, is Croatia's public broadcasting company. It operates several radio and television channels, over a domestic transmitter network as well as satellite. HRT is divided into thr ...

(HRT) started to transmit DVB-S programmes in 1997. It transmits all four state-owned TV channels (

HRT 1 HRT 1 (HTV 1, ''"Prvi program"'') is the first Croatian television channel, operated by Hrvatska Radiotelevizija. It is a generalist channel, whose diverse programming lineup includes documentaries, history, school, mosaics, news, sitcoms, movies ...

HRT 2 HRT 2 (HTV 2, ''"Drugi program"'') is a Croatian free-to-air television channel, operated by Hrvatska Radiotelevizija (HRT). Its line-up focuses mainly on entertainment, although it also broadcasts news and documentaries. A new broadcast of HRT2, ...

HRT 3 HRT 3 (HTV 3, ''"Treći program"'') is a Croatian free-to-air television channel from Hrvatska Radiotelevizija, that was launched on 13 September 2012. History HRT 3's original history began in 1989, when this channel was originally known as Z3 a ...

and

HRT 4 HRT 4 (HTV 4, ''"Četvrti program"'') is a Croatian free-to-air television channel from Hrvatska Radiotelevizija, which was launched on 24 December 2012. Its programming is centred towards newscasts. Programming * Dnevnik HRT * Regionalni dnevnik ...

), and three radio stations (HR 1, HR 2 and HR 3). Croatia started to test

transmission early in 2002. It transmitted 4 national TV channels (HRT 1, HRT 2,

and Nova TV) on a network of 9 transmitters built by

Odašiljači i veze Odašiljači i veze d.o.o. (OiV) is a Croatian limited liability company (''društvo s ograničenom odgovornošću''), terrestrial television and WiMAX operator born from the separation from Hrvatska Radiotelevizija in 2001. Croatia started to te ...

, completed in 2007 and covering about 70% of the country. Entire Croatia is covered with

in from 5 October 2010. The analogue switch-off process took place region by region, starting from January 2010 in

Istria Istria ( ; Croatian language, Croatian and Slovene language, Slovene: ; ist, Eîstria; Istro-Romanian language, Istro-Romanian, Italian language, Italian and Venetian language, Venetian: ; formerly in Latin and in Ancient Greek) is the larges ...

and

Rijeka Rijeka ( , , ; also known as Fiume hu, Fiume, it, Fiume ; local Chakavian: ''Reka''; german: Sankt Veit am Flaum; sl, Reka) is the principal seaport and the third-largest city in Croatia (after Zagreb and Split). It is located in Primor ...

region and completing the switch-off on 5 October 2010 when the final region (

Zagreb Zagreb ( , , , ) is the capital (political), capital and List of cities and towns in Croatia#List of cities and towns, largest city of Croatia. It is in the Northern Croatia, northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slop ...

) was converted fully to

MPEG-2 MPEG-2 (a.k.a. H.222/H.262 as was defined by the ITU) is a standard for "the generic video coding format, coding of moving pictures and associated audio information". It describes a combination of Lossy compression, lossy video compression and ...

SDTV Standard-definition television (SDTV, SD, often shortened to standard definition) is a television system which uses a resolution that is not considered to be either high or enhanced definition. "Standard" refers to it being the prevailing sp ...

is selected as a platform for free-to-air channels, initially with two MUX channels covering, where MUX A would be used by public TV

(HRT) and MUX B used by commercial TV stations, while later MUX C and MUX D will be populated by HD and regional channels, respectively. Croatia has started transition in 2019 to DVB-T2 HVEC for national broadcast.

Czech Republic

Analogue terrestrial television was switched off on 30 November 2011.

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...

launched first experimental

broadcast in May 2000, which was then made available to the public in October 2005. There are currently 4 primary multiplexes and 8 regional multiplexes (RS1-RS8). As of November 2019,

started the transition to the

standard. This transition will be finished on 24 June 2020, when

broadcast will be terminated nationwide.

Finland

Analogue terrestrial television was switched off in

Finland Finland ( fi, Suomi ; sv, Finland ), officially the Republic of Finland (; ), is a Nordic country in Northern Europe. It shares land borders with Sweden to the northwest, Norway to the north, and Russia to the east, with the Gulf of B ...

on 1 September 2007, and analogue cable television on 1 March 2008. All pay-TV channels switched to DVB-T2 in May 2017. Finland switches fully to

on March 31, 2020

Ireland

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

, there are a number of providers of digital television. These include

Sky Ireland Sky Ireland Limited is a subsidiary of Comcast-owned Sky and supplies television, internet and telephony services in Ireland. Its corporate headquarters are in Dublin which were opened by Taoiseach Enda Kenny on 18 January 2013. Sky Ireland e ...

which is operated by

Sky plc Sky Group Limited is a British media and telecommunications conglomerate, which is a division of Comcast, and headquartered in London. It has operations in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland and Italy. Sky is Europe's l ...

(available nationwide), while

Virgin Media Ireland Virgin Media Ireland is Liberty Global's telecommunications operation in Ireland. It is the largest digital cable television provider within the country. As of 31 December 2014, the company offers broadband internet, digital television and ...

Magnet Networks Magnet Networks is an Irish company providing telephone, television and broadband internet via subscription over an optical fiber-HFC cable network. Magnet Networks was launched in Dublin in 2004, and is wholly owned by the US-based international ...

and Cablecomm provide various digital-cable services. Digital Television is also available by IPTV provider

. *In 2008 Boxer TV were awarded the position to operate Ireland's Digital Terrestrial Television platform which was meant to be rolled with RTÉ NL over the next 5 years. This service was to offer subscription services and free-to-air channels sometime in late 2009 using MPEG4 standard. On 9 May 2009 it was reported OneVision were then likely to operate the pay DTT service. The official announcement was made later that month. Due to an economic downturn in the Irish economy, Boxer TV, which operated in Sweden and Denmark claimed it was unfeasible for the company to operate in Ireland. On 11 May 2009 it was reported Onevision would operate the pay DTT service. Further setbacks were announced on 9 July 2009 when it was confirmed by Ireland's national broadcaster that

RTÉ (RTÉ) (; Irish language, Irish for "Radio & Television of Ireland") is the Public broadcaster, national broadcaster of Republic of Ireland, Ireland headquartered in Dublin. It both produces and broadcasts programmes on RTÉ Television, telev ...

would not launch its DTT service until other media partners were ready to launch their services. The original launch date was September 2009 and finally took place in October 2010.

Italy

Latvia

Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

now has three major forms of broadcast

. Terrestrial (

) using MPEG4 and MPEG2, Cable ( DVB-C) using MPEG4 and MPEG2, and Satellite ( DVB-S). In addition multiple

services are available.

Lithuania

Lithuania Lithuania (; lt, Lietuva ), officially the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublika, links=no ), is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. Lithuania ...

now has three major forms of broadcast

. Terrestrial (

) using MPEG-4, Cable ( DVB-C), and Satellite ( DVB-S). In addition

services are available.

Netherlands

The

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

now has three major forms of broadcast

. Terrestrial (

), Cable ( DVB-C), and Satellite (

DVB-S2 Digital Video Broadcasting - Satellite - Second Generation (DVB-S2) is a digital television broadcast standard that has been designed as a successor for the popular DVB-S system. It was developed in 2003 by the Digital Video Broadcasting Proje ...

). In addition

services are available. In the past Analogue TV was broadcast in PAL terrestrial and cable. Terrestrial broadcasting switched to the Digital standard (

) in 2007 and to (

) in 2019. Cable started broadcasting digital in 2001. Most cable companies switched off Analogue in 2021. Satellite broadcasting switched to the Digital standard ( DVB-S) in 1996 and to (

) around 2010. The last ( DVB-S) channels were shutdown in 2016. DVB-H was only available for a brief period between 2008 and 2011 in the bigger cities. Lack of interest led to the shutdown of DVB-H.

Norway

The shutdown of the analogue service in Norway started on March 4, 2008, and was finished on December 1, 2009. (MPEG-4)

Poland

Analogue broadcast switch-off started on 7 November 2012 and was completed by 31 July 2013.

Portugal

Portugal started its first digital broadcast with TVCabo Satélite (nowadays known as "NOS TV Satélite") in 1998, later, in 2001, implementation of Interactive services brought digital TV to the wired cable networks. While the Satellite branch was (and still is) popular in areas where the Cable branch is not available (such as remote areas and villages), iTV never became successful, and was later discontinued in 2002. Digital broadcast was still available under the name "powerbox" (after the STB used to receive the signal). In 2005, a little "analog switchover" happened, where coded analog channels (known as Premium) would cease broadcast in favour of powerbox. Every pay-TV provider offers digital television. As of 2010, all Premium channels in all pay-TV providers, are digital. DTT started on November 1, 2008, for

Lisbon Lisbon (; pt, Lisboa ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 544,851 within its administrative limits in an area of 100.05 km2. Grande Lisboa, Lisbon's urban area extends beyond the city's administr ...

and Castelo Branco, and on April 26, 2009, for 80% of the country, and the government plans to cover the rest of the country until 2010-2011 New Year's Eve. Analog will then be switched off 6 months after TDT covers 87% of the country via terrestrial transmitters and 13% via satellite complementary coverage.

Romania

https://web.archive.org/web/20161127022323/http://www.tvdigitala.ro/acoperire/ http://www.dvbt.ro/ http://www.radiocom.ro/poze/dvb-t2/Tranzitie%20DVB-T2_Octombrie_2016.pdf

Russia

Russia uses DVB-T2 standard for digital broadcasting. The transition to digital terrestrial TV broadcasting was initiated in Russia in 2009 and took almost 10 years. Russian digital broadcasting consists of two "multiplexes" with 10 channels each which are generally available everywhere in the country. There is also a third "multiplex" which was originally supposed to be regional-oriented but it is deployed only in some regions, e.g., Moscow.

Serbia

The transition to DVB-T2 digital

television in Serbia Television in Serbia was introduced in 1958. It remains the most popular of the media in Serbia—according to 2009 survey, Serbian people watch on average 6 hours of television per day, making it the highest average in Europe. Free-to-air terrest ...

started on September 1, 2014, and was finished on June 1, 2015. Analogue terrestrial television was finally switched off on June 7, 2015. As of that day, nearly 97.8% of country's population is covered by digital signal.

Slovenia

Slovenia completed its switch to DVB-T (MPEG-4) on the 1st December 2010 with the termination of all analogue transmissions on a single day. There are two multiplexes carried nationwide as well as several local multiplexes.

Spain

The development of digital terrestrial television was very similar to the failure of

ITV Digital ITV Digital was a British digital terrestrial television broadcaster which launched a pay-TV service on the world's first digital terrestrial television network. Its main shareholders were Carlton Communications plc and Granada plc, owners o ...

in the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

. In 1999, digital terrestrial television was introduced in the country by the pay per view platform Quiero Television. In May 2002, statewide operators were required to start broadcasting in

. Yet, Quiero TV ceased transmissions in 2002 after a commercial failure. Unlike the UK, the three and half multiplexes left by the platform were not reassigned to other operators, and so 5 channels were squashed into a single multiplex. On 30 November 2005, digital terrestrial television was relaunched as a free service with 20 channels and 14 radio stations, along with 23 regional- and local-language channels in their respective areas. Each multiplex has a minimum of 4 SD channels each or one HD channel. By 2010, coverage reached over 98% of the population, and the analog signal was switched off on 2 April 2010.

Sweden

The shutdown of the analogue service in

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

started on September 19, 2005, and was finished on October 29, 2007.

United Kingdom

The United Kingdom now has five major forms of broadcast digital television, direct-to-home satellite services provided by

British Sky Broadcasting Sky UK Limited is a British broadcaster and telecommunications company that provides television and broadband Internet services, fixed line and mobile telephone services to consumers and businesses in the United Kingdom. It is a subsidiary of ...

(branded as

) and

Freesat Freesat is a British free-to-air satellite television service, first formed as a joint venture between the BBC and ITV plc and now owned by Digital UK. The service was formed as a memorandum in 2007 and has been marketed since 6 May 2008. Free ...

, digital cable television services provided by

Virgin Media Virgin Media is a British telecommunications company which provides telephone, Cable television, television and Internet access, internet services in the United Kingdom. Its headquarters are at Green Park in Reading, Berkshire, Reading, Engla ...

and

WightFibre WightFibre is a full-fibre network operator on the Isle of Wight. WightFibre provides telephone and broadband internet In telecommunications, broadband is wide bandwidth data transmission which transports multiple signals at a wide range o ...

, and a free-to-air digital terrestrial service called

. In addition there are two

systems known as

TalkTalk TV TalkTalk TV is a UK-based consumer television and video on demand service, operated by the TalkTalk Group that originally launched in 2000. In September 2012, the current TalkTalk TV was launched in partnership with YouView. Its television an ...

owned by

The Carphone Warehouse The Carphone Warehouse Limited was a mobile phone retailer based in London, United Kingdom. In August 2014 the company became a subsidiary of Currys plc (previously named "Dixons Carphone"), which was formed by the merger of its former parent Ca ...

, and

BT Vision BT TV is a subscription IPTV service offered by BT; a division of United Kingdom telecommunications company BT Group, and was originally launched as BT Vision in December 2006. As of the end of June 2019, BT TV had 1.9 million customers. ...

, which is provided by BT. Individual access methods vary throughout the country.

Terrestrial

The initial attempt at launching a digital terrestrial broadcasting service on November 15, 1998,

ONdigital ITV Digital was a British digital terrestrial television broadcaster which launched a pay-TV service on the world's first digital terrestrial television network. Its main shareholders were Carlton Communications plc and Granada plc, owners o ...

(later called

), was unsuccessful and the company went into

liquidation Liquidation is the process in accounting by which a company is brought to an end in Canada, United Kingdom, United States, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, Italy, and many other countries. The assets and property of the company are redistrib ...

. ITV Digital was replaced in late 2002 by Freeview, which uses the same

technology, but with higher levels of

error correction In information theory and coding theory with applications in computer science and telecommunication, error detection and correction (EDAC) or error control are techniques that enable reliable delivery of digital data over unreliable communica ...

and more robust (but lower-capacity) modulation on the "Public Service" multiplexes in an attempt to counter the reception problems which dogged its predecessor. Rather than concentrating on

Pay TV Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichannel television providers, b ...

services, Freeview uses the available capacity to provide a

free-to-air Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the FTA Receiver, appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring ...

service that includes all the existing five free-to-air analogue terrestrial channels and about twenty new digital channels. All services are transmitted in

mode. March 31, 2004 saw the return of a limited pay-television offering to the digital terrestrial platform with the launch of

Top Up TV Top Up TV was a pay TV service in the United Kingdom which launched in March 2004, operating on the digital terrestrial television platform. The aim of the service was to "top up" Freeview customers by providing additional content and service ...

. This new service is designed to appeal to those who do not want to pay the high subscription fees that Sky Television and the Cable networks demand. The service carries a restricted hours service of some of the UK's most watched channels including the

Discovery Channel Discovery Channel (known as The Discovery Channel from 1985 to 1995, and often referred to as simply Discovery) is an American cable channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, a publicly traded company run by CEO David Zaslav. , Discovery Channe ...

Gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile met ...

Discovery Real Time Discovery Real Time was a British television channel owned by Discovery Networks UK focused on educational and learning content. History It was originally launched on 9 March 1992 as The Learning Channel, United Kingdom's version of the Ameri ...

British Eurosport Eurosport 1 is a French television sports network channel which is a division of Eurosport and a subsidiary of Warner Bros. Discovery. Discovery took a 20% minority interest share in December 2012, and became majority shareholder in the Eurospo ...

and

Cartoon Network Cartoon Network (often abbreviated as CN) is an American cable television channel owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. It is a part of The Cartoon Network, Inc., a division that also has the broadcasting and production activities of Boomerang, Car ...

, sharing just three different slots. In October 2006, Top Up TV renamed itself

Top Up TV Anytime Top Up TV was a pay TV service in the United Kingdom which launched in March 2004, operating on the digital terrestrial television platform. The aim of the service was to "top up" Freeview customers by providing additional content and services ...

, taking advantage of the increase in the popularity of

digital video recorder A digital video recorder (DVR) is an electronic device that records video in a digital format to a disk drive, USB flash drive, SD memory card, SSD or other local or networked mass storage device. The term includes set-top boxes with direct to d ...

s, and its limited channel space. Now over 100 programs (not channels) are broadcast overnight and added to the box's hard drive, and may be watched at any time. Channels that provide content for the overnight service include

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

Nickelodeon Nickelodeon (often shortened to Nick) is an American pay television television channel, channel which launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children. It is run by Paramount Global through its List of assets owned by Param ...

and

Hallmark Channel The Hallmark Channel is an American television channel owned by Crown Media Holdings, Inc., which in turn is owned by Hallmark Cards, Inc. The channel's programming is primarily targeted at families, and features a mix of television movies and ...

. 2005 saw the first areas of the United Kingdom losing their analogue signal in a pilot test. The residents of

Ferryside Ferryside ( cy, Glan-y-fferi) is a village in the community of St Ishmael, Carmarthenshire, Wales. It is south of Carmarthen near the mouth of the River Tywi. Originally a ferry crossing, then becoming a fishing village, it has developed as a ...

and

Llansteffan Llansteffan, is a village and a community situated on the south coast of Carmarthenshire, Wales, lying on the estuary of the River Tywi, south of Carmarthen. Description The community includes Llanybri and is bordered by the communities of: L ...

Carmarthenshire Carmarthenshire ( cy, Sir Gaerfyrddin; or informally ') is a county in the south-west of Wales. The three largest towns are Llanelli, Carmarthen and Ammanford. Carmarthen is the county town and administrative centre. The county is known as ...

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

who had not already upgraded to digital television were given a free set-top box to receive the

television service, which includes

Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network operated by the state-owned enterprise, state-owned Channel Four Television Corporation. It began its transmission on 2 November 1982 and was established to provide a four ...

(previously unavailable terrestrially from transmitters in Wales) and

S4C2 S4C (, ''Sianel Pedwar Cymru'', meaning ''Channel Four Wales'') is a Welsh language free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel. Launched on 1 November 1982, it was the first television ch ...

, which broadcasts sessions of the

National Assembly for Wales The Senedd (; ), officially known as the Welsh Parliament in English language, English and () in Welsh language, Welsh, is the Devolution in the United Kingdom, devolved, unicameral legislature of Wales. A democratically elected body, it makes ...

. Digital transmissions for this pilot commenced in December 2004, at which time a message was added to the analogue picture advising viewers that the analogue services would end in February 2005. 2005 also saw the announcement by the regulator

Ofcom The Office of Communications, commonly known as Ofcom, is the government-approved regulatory and competition authority for the broadcasting, telecommunications and postal industries of the United Kingdom. Ofcom has wide-ranging powers acros ...

about the proposed analogue switch off plans for the UK. The switch off progressed on an

ITV ITV or iTV may refer to: ITV *Independent Television (ITV), a British television network, consisting of: ** ITV (TV network), a free-to-air national commercial television network covering the United Kingdom, the Isle of Man, and the Channel Islan ...

region by region basis that began in 2008 with the

Border Borders are usually defined as geographical boundaries, imposed either by features such as oceans and terrain, or by political entities such as governments, sovereign states, federated states, and other subnational entities. Political borders c ...

region, and ended in the UTV region in 2012. The coverage of the three public service broadcasting multiplexes is the same as that enjoyed by the former analogue TV stations (98.5% of the population), while the three commercial multiplexes cover 90% of the population.

=Freeview HD

= The BBC, ITV,

and Channel 5 ran terrestrial HDTV trials involving 450 homes in the London area during June–December 2006 on locally unused frequencies. As part of this trial, the BBC broadcast

BBC HD BBC HD was a 24-hour high-definition television channel provided by the BBC. The service was initially run as a trial from 15 May 2006 until becoming a full service on 1 December 2007 before its discontinuation on 26 March 2013. It broadcast ...

, which was free to air but could not be received by any set-top boxes commercially available at the time. It could however be received and played back by any PC equipped with a

card using a software

H.264 Advanced Video Coding (AVC), also referred to as H.264 or MPEG-4 Part 10, is a video compression standard based on block-oriented, motion-compensated coding. It is by far the most commonly used format for the recording, compression, and distr ...

decoder Decoder may refer to: Technology * Audio decoder converts digital audio to analog form * Binary decoder, digital circuits such as 1-of-N and seven-segment decoders * Decompress (compression decoder), converts compressed data (e.g., audio/video/im ...

. With two channels (

and

ITV HD ITV1 HD is a British free-to-air high-definition public broadcast television network operated by ITV plc, the company which is contracted to provide 13 ITV1 services across the UK. ITV1 HD simulcasts them in high-definition (excluding former Cha ...

), Freeview HD completed a "technical launch" on 2 December 2009 from the

Crystal Palace Crystal Palace may refer to: Places Canada * Crystal Palace Complex (Dieppe), a former amusement park now a shopping complex in Dieppe, New Brunswick * Crystal Palace Barracks, London, Ontario * Crystal Palace (Montreal), an exhibition building ...

and Winter Hill transmitters. This time, in addition to H.264 being used as the codec, the broadcast utilised

rather than the DVB-T used by standard Freeview and the earlier test broadcasts, thus requiring users to purchase new reception equipment. Freeview HD was the first operational TV service in the world to use the DVB-T2 standard. Freeview HD set-top boxes and televisions were made available at the consumer launch of the service in early 2010. In order to qualify for the Freeview HD logo, receivers need to be IPTV-capable and display Freeview branding, including the logo, on the

electronic programme guide Electronic programming guides (EPGs) and interactive programming guides (IPGs) are menu-based systems that provide users of television, radio and other media applications with continuously updated menus that display scheduling information for ...

screen. On 25 March 2010 Channel 4 HD was added to Freeview HD on channel 52 with a placeholding caption; it launched on 30 March 2010, coinciding with the commercial launch of Freeview HD.

S4C Clirlun S4C (, ''Sianel Pedwar Cymru'', meaning ''Channel Four Wales'') is a Welsh language free-to-air public broadcast television channel. Launched on 1 November 1982, it was the first television channel to be aimed specifically at a Welsh-speaking ...

launched in April 2010 in Wales, where Channel 4 HD is not available. BBC One HD was also added to the service on 3 November 2010.

Cable

Virgin Media (formerly known as NTL:Telewest, after a merger of NTL Incorporated with Telewest Global, Inc.), became in 2006 the first " quadruple-play" media company in the United Kingdom, bringing together a service consisting of television, broadband internet, mobile phone and fixed-line telephone services. Virgin Media ranks as the UK's second largest pay TV service, having 3.6m subscribers and 55% national availability. Trials of the UK's first HDTV service, the TVDrive PVR from

Telewest Telewest (previously Telewest Broadband and Telewest Communications) was a cable internet, broadband internet, telephone supplier and cable television provider in the United Kingdom. It was listed on the London Stock Exchange, and was also o ...

, began on 1 December 2005 on a commercial pilot basis before a full launch in March 2006. Due to the merger between NTL and Telewest, the TVDrive was made available to NTL cable customers in the Teesside and Glasgow areas on 16 November 2006. In January 2007, NTL:Telewest began renting the STB nationwide and since the acquisition of the Virgin Media name, it is now officially available in all areas with the new V+ branding. Virgin Media is also the only cable provider to supply video on demand services. As of October 2009, Virgin Media are broadcasting seven HD channels with plans for further new HD channels during 2010.

also provide cable television to the residents of the

Isle of Wight The Isle of Wight ( ) is a county in the English Channel, off the coast of Hampshire, from which it is separated by the Solent. It is the largest and second-most populous island of England. Referred to as 'The Island' by residents, the Isle of ...

Satellite

On 1 November 2005

turned off

encryption In cryptography, encryption is the process of encoding information. This process converts the original representation of the information, known as plaintext, into an alternative form known as ciphertext. Ideally, only authorized parties can decip ...

on all of its satellite-based signals, following the lead from the

BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...

...

Africa

Botswana

Mozambique

Morocco

Namibia

South Africa

Egypt

Asia

Afghanistan

Cambodia

China

Hong Kong

India

Indonesia

Iran

Israel

Japan

South Korea (Republic of Korea)

Malaysia

Pakistan

Philippines

Saudi Arabia

Kuwait

Singapore

Sri Lanka

Taiwan

Thailand

Vietnam

Oceania

Australia

Digital Satellite

Digital Free-to-air

Digital Cable

Cook Islands

Digital Free to Air

New Zealand

Satellite

Terrestrial

Europe

Albania

Belgium

Bulgaria

Croatia

Czech Republic

Finland

Ireland

Italy

Latvia

Lithuania

Netherlands

Norway

Poland

Portugal

Romania

Russia

Serbia

Slovenia

Spain

Sweden

United Kingdom

Terrestrial

=Freeview HD

Cable

Satellite

North America

Canada

Mexico

Official plan for Mexican DTT

Greenland

United States

Central America

Costa Rica

El Salvador

Guatemala

Honduras

Panama

South America

Argentina

Bolivia

Brazil