BBC One


BBC One is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It is the corporation's oldest and flagship channel, and is known for broadcasting mainstream programming, which includes BBC News television bulletins, primetime drama and entertainment, and live BBC Sport events.
The channel was launched on 2 November 1936 under the name BBC Television Service, which was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution. It was renamed BBC TV in 1960 and used this name until the launch of the second BBC channel, BBC Two, in 1964. The main channel then became known as BBC1. The channel adopted the current spelling of BBC One in 1997.
The channel's annual budget for 2024–2025 was £1.28 billion. It is funded by the television licence fee together with the BBC's other domestic television stations and shows uninterrupted programming without commercial advertising. The television channel had the highest reach share of any broadcaster in the United Kingdom as at 2019, ahead of its traditional rival for ratings leadership ITV. In 2013, a study conducted across 14 countries by the polling organisation Populus found BBC One to be the station most favourably viewed by its country, with BBC Two coming in third place.

Availability

BBC One is available via most major television providers in the United Kingdom.

Terrestrial

  • Freeview: Channel 1, Channel 101

    Satellite

  • Freesat: Channel 101
  • Sky: Channel 101

    Cable

  • Virgin Media: Channel 101

    IPTV

  • Sky Glass: Channel 101
  • Freely: Channel 1

    Streaming

  • BBC iPlayer

    History

Early years and launch

The BBC began its own regular television programming from the basement of Broadcasting House, London, on 22 August 1932. The channel officially began regular broadcasts on 2 November 1936 at three o'clock in the afternoon from a converted wing of the Alexandra Palace in London.
On 1 September 1939, two days before Britain declared war on Germany, the station was taken off air with little warning, with the last programme to be shown being a Mickey Mouse cartoon ; the government was concerned that the VHF transmissions would act as a beacon to enemy aircraft that could bomb London.
BBC Television returned on 7 June 1946 at three o'clock in the afternoon. Jasmine Bligh, one of the original announcers, made the first announcement, saying, "Good afternoon everybody. How are you? Do you remember me, Jasmine Bligh?". Twenty minutes later, BBC Television again aired the Mickey Mouse cartoon that they had broadcast in 1939. The channel was made available outside of London for the first time on 17 December 1949, when the Sutton Coldfield transmitting station in the Midlands opened. The BBC hoped for the service to reach 70% of the British population by 1952, then 80% by 1954.

Creation of BBC1

The BBC held a statutory monopoly on television broadcasting in the United Kingdom until Associated-Rediffusion, the first Independent Television station, began to broadcast on 22 September 1955. The competition quickly forced the channel to change its identity and priorities, following a large reduction in its audience, as noted in the 1962 Pilkington Report on the future of broadcasting. Simultaneously, the Pilkington Report decided to award an additional television station to the BBC on the basis that ITV was in comparison lacking in serious programming.
BBC Television became BBC1 when BBC2 launched on 20 April 1964, transmitting an incompatible 625-line image on UHF. The only way to receive all channels was to use a complex "dual-standard" 405- and 625-line receiver with both a VHF and a UHF aerial. BBC1 moved to purpose-built facilities at Television Centre on 20 September 1969. Television News continued to use Alexandra Palace as its base and by early 1968 had even converted one of its studios to colour. In the weeks leading up to 15 November 1969, BBC1 unofficially transmitted the occasional programme in its new colour system in order to test it. At midnight on 15 November, simultaneously with ITV and two years after BBC2 had done so, BBC1 officially began 625-line PAL colour programming on UHF with a broadcast of a concert by Petula Clark. Colour transmissions could be received in monochrome via monochrome 625-line sets until the end of analogue broadcasting.
Between 1973 and 1977, BBC1 achieved an average audience share of 45% under Bryan Cowgill. This was the channel's most successful period in terms of audience share.
On 30 December 1980, the BBC announced plans to introduce a new breakfast television service to compete with TV-am. They stated that the new show would be broadcast before TV-am but included the caveat that the new show would not launch until at least November 1981, whereupon new licence fee income could finance the necessary extension of broadcasting hours. On 17 January 1983, one year after originally planned, the first edition of Breakfast Time was shown on BBC1, becoming the first UK wide breakfast television service and continued to lead in the ratings until 1984.

Michael Grade era (1984–1987)

In 1984, Bill Cotton become managing director of Television at the BBC, and set about overhauling BBC1, which had been slated with poor home grown shows, its heavy reliance on US imports, with Dallas and The Thorn Birds being BBC1's highest rated programmes and ratings being over 20% behind ITV. Cotton recruited Michael Grade to become Controller of BBC1 from 1 September 1984 the first time the corporation had recruited someone outside of the BBC, replacing Alan Hart, who had been criticised for his lack of knowledge in general entertainment, as he was head of BBC Sport prior to 1981.
The first major overhaul was to axe the unpopular Sixty Minutes current affairs programme: this was a replacement for the news and magazine show Nationwide. Its replacement was the BBC Six O'Clock News, a straight news programme in a bid to shore up its failing early evening slot. It was believed the BBC were planning to cut short the evening news and move more light entertainment programming in from the 18:20 slot, but this was dismissed. The Miss Great Britain contest was dropped, being described as verging on the too offensive after the January 1985 contest, with World's Strongest Man and International Superstar also being cancelled.
BBC1 was relaunched on 18 February 1985 with a new look, new programming including Wogan and EastEnders, and a revised schedule to help streamline and maintain viewers throughout the course of the evening. Grade started to gear most programmes to either on the hour or half past the hour, while Panorama and Omnibus were both moved after the Nine O'Clock News. Grade was also determined to end the dated and inept BBC1 scheduling which was hampering the channel and holding back good programmes. Grade said "When I took over BBC1, I discovered there were wonderful things, it was just a case of where to put them." Wogan had been scheduled for a 10 pm slot, but Grade moved it to a 7 pm slot as he believed the show had potential.
From February to August 1985, a high number of American mini-series were broadcast while filming took place of a number of new home grown programmes, including 'Allo 'Allo!, In Sickness and in Health, and Open All Hours. Further improvement came about when the corporation strengthened its drama output costing £30 million, with eight new series, including Howards' Way, All Creatures Great and Small, Hold the Back Page, and Bluebill, along with the return of Bergerac and Big Deal. The increase in the drama department was achieved by switching the money away from the administrative service over a three-year period, after BBC1 was criticised for failing to match ITV's output in drama. EastEnders was moved to a 19:30 slot, where it managed to soar to 20 million, helping the BBC1 audience share increase to nearly 50% for the first time since 1982.
On 27 February 1985, Doctor Who was placed on an 18-month hiatus. The BBC originally planned to axe the series as they wished to spend its budgets on new programming for the channel, but was forced to back down from public pressure and Doctor Who returned in September 1986. At the time Michael Grade and Jonathan Powell were blamed for the decision.
On 9 September 1985, the long-standing children's programming block was overhauled and rebranded as Children's BBC, which gave it dedicated idents for the first time and had a live in-vision presenter, similar to rival ITV's Children's ITV block which had been running since January 1983. Previously the BBC had broadcast children's programming using BBC1's team of regular duty announcers. The launch presenter for this block, and thus the first Children's BBC presenter of the current format, was Phillip Schofield.
On 23 May 1986, long-running lunchtime magazine show Pebble Mill at One was broadcast for the last time after being on air for 14 years. On 27 October 1986, BBC1 launched its daytime television schedules. In a statement, BBC Daytime head Roger Laughton said:

1990s

Stereo audio transmissions, using the NICAM digital stereo sound format began on BBC1 in late 1987, to coincide with the sale of the first consumer NICAM-enabled equipment, a year after BBC2, and were gradually phased in across BBC TV output, although it took until 31 August 1991 for the service to begin officially on both channels. During this time, both commercial analogue broadcasters, ITV and Channel 4 had officially begun stereo transmissions using the BBC-developed NICAM system. Widescreen programming was introduced on digital platforms in 1998.
For the first 50 years of its existence, with the exception of films and programmes purchased from the United States and elsewhere, almost all the channel's output were produced by the BBC's in-house production departments. This changed following the passing of the Broadcasting Act 1990, which required that 25% of the BBC's television output be out-sourced to independent production companies. By 2004, many popular BBC One shows were made for the channel by independents, but the in-house production departments continued to contribute heavily to the schedule.
In March 1991, as part of the £63 million programme package for spring and summer line up on BBC1, it was announced an extra £20 million was to be spent on rejuvenating the channels drama and comedy output during peak times, to keep the channel in a healthy state once the new Channel 3 licences were awarded.
In December 1991 Wogan was to be cancelled, due to falling ratings against a number of ITV shows, in which Wogan only managed six million viewers compared to double that for This Is Your Life, The Krypton Factor and The $64,000 Question. Additionally an extra £40 million a year was spent on narrowing the gap on ITV's ratings lead, since a few months prior to this the channel had been criticised for its Autumn schedule, having tired formats, uninspiring scheduling of new programmes and poor scripts. Wogan was replaced with Eldorado, in early July 1992, but this was itself cancelled a year later.
Alan Yentob launched the 1993 Autumn schedule calling it "My first try with a lot of help from my friends", with the channel still under criticism, following the start of new programming which Alan introduced a year earlier, and the number of summer repeats. £175 million was spent on 80 hours of original drama produced, enchantment to the arts with an extended 26-week run for Omnibus, and documentaries with The Downing Street Years, new wildlife series and an eight-month look at Sheffield's Children's hospital, while Goodnight Sweetheart, Grace & Favour and The Danny Baker Show were new comedy series. Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman included in the Saturday night line up to increase variety.
Following the public disapproval of filling its schedule with 25% of repeats during the summer months of 1993, BBC1 agreed to broadcast an extra 110 hours worth of original programming over the same period during the summer in 1994, which included giving EastEnders an additional episode per week. Efficiency savings of £25 million were found and redeployed to the new productions. The savings were seen as a vindication for Producer Choice, the controversial internal market introduced in April 1993.
By March 1999, the channel admitted defeat in its ratings war with ITV, with its spring line up emphasising more on serious factual and educational programmes, and drama. This change in strategy came about after continuing complaints that the channel was appealing to the lowest common denominator to increase viewership. Reliance on docusoaps and the dropping of the vilified Noel's House Party were chastened by the hoax guests on The Vanessa Show. Alan Yentob said "The spring package is to remind people of what the BBC is here for, range and ambition you won't find anywhere else at peak time". The changes helped the channel distinguish itself from "its down-market rival and would not compete for viewers on ITV's terms."