ITVBe

ITVBe is a British free-to-air television channel owned by ITV Digital Channels, a division of ITV plc. The channel was first announced on 12 February 2014 and launched on 8 October 2014. ITVBe broadcasts reality and unscripted programmes, including US acquisitions such as The Real Housewives franchise, Million Dollar Listing New York, and Botched; and original programming such as The Real Housewives of Cheshire, Dinner Date, and The Only Way Is Essex. The channel has also occasionally aired feature films, particularly from the romantic comedy genre, along with occasional dramatic and comedy programming focused on women.

A high-definition simulcast, ITVBe HD, launched on Virgin Media on 19 November 2014, along with a one-hour timeshift feed, ITVBe +1. Both channels were exclusive to Virgin until the ITVBe +1 service was made available on Sky and Freesat on 15 December 2014, and the ITVBe HD service on 12 December 2023. As part of a number of changes to ITV's broadcasting, ITVBe +1 was removed from Sky and Freesat on 13 April 2021.

The channel will be replaced by a newly-formatted quiz show channel to be known as ITV Quiz in June 2025; ITVBe's existing programming will be spread out among ITV2 and ITVX.

Most watched programmes

The following is a list of the ten most watched episodes of a series on ITVBe since the channel began broadcasting in October 2014. Figures are based on Live +7 data supplied by BARB. The Only Way Is Essex is consistently the highest rated series on ITVBe.

Associated services

EarlyBe

EarlyBe, a service that is part of ITV Hub (now ITVX), launched on 3 September 2020, allowing viewers to watch the network's programming on the site day-and-date before its premiere on ITVBe; programming appears on the service at 7 a.m.

LittleBe

ITVBe channel introduced a new children's strand, LittleBe on 3 September 2018, which was dedicated to preschool programming and aired daily from 9 a.m. to noon, including among its programming longtime CITV staples Sooty and Postman Pat. The strand closed without advanced notice on 31 May 2024.

References

Uses material from the Wikipedia article ITVBe, released under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license.