Advanced Television

Italy: 413 TV channels available

March 27, 2020

From Branislav Pekic in Rome

Italians were able to receive 413 TV channels at the end of 2019 on the main distribution platforms, of which 347 produced by broadcasters based in Italy (126 on DTT and 286 on satellite).

The figures come from the latest ConfindustriaTV report on the state of the Italian TV sector.

Among the 347 national TV channels, there were 24 time-shifted versions (compared to 40 in 2016), 35 PPV services, while the remaining 229 were so-called “parent” primary TV channels (excluding duplicate HD and time-shifted versions), a figure that includes FTA and PPV.

There are 112 HD channels (32 per cent of the channel offer), mainly on satellite (109), with 40 of them FTA and 15 native (HD only).

There are 149 FTA channels (DTT and TivùSat) and 198 pay services now provided by a single operator (Sky Italia) after the closure of Mediaset Premium. Among FTA channels, 106 are on DTT, while of the subscription based channels, 191 TV are on satellite and 20 on DTT.

The main broadcasting groups present on all platform are Sky Italia (112), Mediaset Group (37), RAI (27), Discovery Italia (23) and Fox Italia (18) and together they have 215 TV channels, or 63 per cent of the total.

Most of them are present both in the FTA and pay-TV segments, with the exception of RAI (only FTA) and Fox (exclusively pay-TV).

Most of the more structured publishers present a diversified offer between free and pay TV, with the exception of the public service operator Rai, with a completely free TV offer, and Fox, exclusively pay TV.

In terms of genre, those dedicated to movies and TV series account for 27 per cent of the total, followed by entertainment (14 per cent, including the factual subgenre), sports (14 per cent) and children (8 per cent).

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