Free-to-air
Free-to-air services are television and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a subscription, other ongoing cost, or one-off fee. In the traditional sense, this is carried on terrestrial radio signals and received with an antenna.
FTA also refers to channels and broadcasters providing content for which no subscription is expected, even though they may be delivered to the viewer/listener by another carrier for which a subscription is required, e.g., cable television, the Internet, or satellite. These carriers may be mandated in some geographies to deliver FTA channels even if a premium subscription is not present, especially where FTA channels are expected to be used for emergency broadcasts, similar to the mandatory emergency phone number service provided by mobile phone operators and manufacturers.
Free-to-view, on the other hand, is generally available without a subscription, but it is digitally encoded and may be restricted geographically. Free-to-air is often used for international broadcasting, making its coverage similar to that of shortwave radio.
Most FTA retailers list free-to-air channel guides and content available in North America for free-to-air use.
Funding
Although commonly described as free, the cost of free-to-air services is met through various means:- Tax funding
- Enforced levy of a licence fee for transmission and production costs
- Voluntary donation for local transmission and production costs
- Commercial advertising for transmission and production costs and surplus revenues returned to the government
- Commercial sponsorship
- Consumer products and services where part of the cost goes toward television advertising and sponsorship
Middle East
Israel
Up until 2012, Israel had several free-to-air channels. The major ones rating-wise were Channel 2, Channel 10, and Channel 1. The other ones were Educational, Channel 33, and Knesset 99. Since 2018, Israel has several new free-to-air channels that replace their older counterparts. The major ones rating-wise: are Channel 12, Channel 13, Kan 11, and Channel 20. The others are Kan Educational, Makan 33, and Knesset Channel.Africa
South Africa
In 1971, the SABC was finally allowed to introduce a television service. Initially, the proposal was for two television channels, one in English and Afrikaans, aimed at white audiences, and another, known as TV Bantu, aimed at black viewers. However, when television was finally introduced, there was only one channel with airtime divided evenly between English and Afrikaans, alternating between the two languages. Test transmissions in Johannesburg began on 5 May 1975, followed in July by ones in Cape Town and Durban. Nationwide services finally commenced on 5 January 1976.In common with most of Western Europe, South Africa used the PAL system for colour television, being only the second terrestrial television service in sub-Saharan Africa to launch with a colour-only service, Zanzibar in Tanzania having introduced the first such service in 1973. The Government, advised by SABC technicians, took the view that colour television would have to be available so as to avoid a costly migration from black-and-white broadcasting technology.
Initially, the TV service was funded entirely through a licence fee as in the UK, charged at R36. However, advertising began on 1 January 1978. On 1 January 1982, two services were introduced, TV2 broadcasting in Zulu and Xhosa and TV3 broadcasting in Sotho and Tswana, aimed at a black urban audience. In 1985, a new service called TV4 was introduced, carrying sports and entertainment programming, using the channel shared by TV2 and TV3, which ended transmissions at 9:30 pm. In 1992, TV2, TV3 and TV4 were combined into a new service called CCV. A third channel was introduced known as TSS, or Topsport Surplus, Topsport being the brand name for the SABC's sport coverage, but this was replaced by NNTV, an educational, non-commercial channel, in 1994.
The main channel, now called TV1, was divided evenly between English and Afrikaans, as before. It also became available in Walvis Bay, an enclave of South Africa in Namibia, which was itself then under South African administration, with a live feed of the channel broadcast via Intelsat being retransmitted on a local low-power repeater. In 1986, the SABC's monopoly was challenged by the launch of a subscription-based service known as M-Net, backed by a consortium of newspaper publishers on 1 October. However, as part of its licensing restrictions, it could not broadcast news programmes, which were still the preserve of the SABC, although M-Net started broadcasting a current affairs programme called Carte Blanche in 1988. As the state-controlled broadcaster, the SABC was accused of bias towards the apartheid regime, giving only limited coverage to opposition politicians.
Asia
Hong Kong
In Hong Kong, the largest and most dominant television channel, Television Broadcasts Limited, was the first free-to-air commercial television channel when it commenced broadcasting on 19 November 1967. It may also well be among the oldest and first stations to broadcast over-the-air in East and Southeast Asia. ViuTV and RTHK TV started broadcasting in 2016.India
Around 600 FTA television channels and 180 radio channels are broadcast from ku-band and c-band transponders on the INSAT-4B and GSAT-15 satellite covering India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal, Sri Lanka and parts of Afghanistan, and Myanmar. In India, the channels are marketed as DD Direct Plus/DD Free Dish by Doordarshan, India's national broadcaster and other Indian private broadcaster ABS Free Dish from the ABS2 satellite. One can receive free-to-air regional TV channels using a small DTH antenna and a free-to-air set-top box.South Korea
In Korea, KBS, MBC, SBS, and EBS are the free-to-air broadcasting stations. They dominate more than 80% of advertisement profits, according to the recent survey from the agency. Due to the recent government's decision, digital television service for all free-to-air networks would be scheduled before 2012, followed by the end of analog television broadcasting.Europe
Satellite
European countries have a tradition of most television services being free-to-air. Germany, in particular, receives in excess of 100 digital satellite TV channels free-to-air. Approximately half of the television channels on SES Astra's 19.2° east and 28.2° east satellite positions, and Eutelsat's Hot Bird are free-to-air. A number of European channels which one might expect to be broadcast free-to-air - including many countries' national terrestrial broadcasters - do not do so via satellite for copyright reasons. Rights to purchase programs for free-to-air broadcast, especially via satellite, are often higher in price than for encrypted broadcast.The lack of FTA among public broadcasters are prevalent in countries whose broadcasters tend to use subtitles for foreign language programmes; although Spain's two public domestic channels, La Una and La Dos, are also encrypted despite dubbed foreign programmes being the norm in Spain. However, these channels usually provide a scheme to offer free, but encrypted, viewing with free-to-view broadcasts. Certain programming on Italy's RAI, and the majority of Dutch channels are covered by such schemes. In Austria, the main national networks broadcast free-to-view via satellite; however, all regional and some smaller channels are transmitted free-to-air, and the national public broadcaster, ORF, offers a special free-to-air channel which airs selected programming without via satellite all over Europe.
As Germany and Austria speak the same language and use the same satellite, Austrian viewers are able to receive about 120 free German-speaking channels from both countries. In general, all satellite radio in Europe is free-to-air, but the more conventional broadcast systems in use mean that SiriusXM style in-car reception is not possible. Cable and satellite distribution allow many more channels to carry sports, movies and specialist channels which are not broadcast as FTA. The viewing figures for these channels are generally much lower than the FTA channels.