BBC considers U-turn on BBC4 shutdown

EXCLUSIVE: The BBC is considering a U-turn to close BBC4 as a TV channel amid solid ratings and backlash over corporate cuts.

The BBC said last year it would close BBC4’s linear channel and bring the brand online from 2025 as part of plans to become a ‘digital-first’ broadcaster.

However, Deadline understands that the BBC’s content team is considering keeping the channel given its relatively low running costs and popularity with viewers.

Sources said no decision had been taken yet, but confidence was growing that it could be saved. “Tim [Davie] intends to save BBC4,” said a source familiar with the director-general’s mindset.

Another BBC insider said the position had not changed since last May, when Davie announced that BBC4 was going online with children’s channel CBBC.

BBC4 has largely become an archive service, curating sophisticated comedy and documentaries for sophisticated viewers. Its £22 million ($27 million) budget is half what it was in 2017, and the BBC’s Ofcom enforceable operating license released last week has reduced the channel’s original production quota to 65%.

Despite the original content cuts, BBC4 gave the world hits such as detectors And Its thicknessposted its highest ratings in a year last December with a monthly reach of 19 million.

That audience fell to 15.8 million in February, but was still twice as rich as BBC3, which was brought back to television last year on a budget of £80 million.

BBC3

There is a growing consensus within the BBC and furthermore the decision to revive BBC3 as a television channel last year was not a success.

The channel’s biggest linear hit was the US version of The traitors rather than an original programme, and there is a feeling that young audiences are not as engaged with the service as the BBC would like. Show how RuPaul’s Drag Race UK continues to perform well, but especially on iPlayer.

BBC3’s monthly audience of 7.4 million viewers in February was the lowest since her return to television in February 2022. A source said the decision to promote BBC3 controller Fiona Campbell to a new role which will appeal does on the BBC’s supervised youth audience means a rethink. However, removing BBC3 from the linear space would be a downward trend, as it only came online in 2016 before that decision was reversed in one of the recent moves by Davie’s predecessor, Tony Hall.

Some see BBC3’s decision as at odds with Davie’s bid to embrace a digital switchover. The director-general said last year the BBC would have “fewer linear broadcast services” over the next decade, but qualified his comments in January by saying they were intended to be “provocative”.

“We have to have an aggressive plan, but it’s not a plan to get rid of things that are used by a lot of people too quickly,” he told the British Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee.

Possible public reactions may also inform BBC4’s decision. The BBC often faces public outrage when it threatens to close services and recently rolled back plans to close the BBC choir after widespread criticism.

There is also a sense that the BBC is over-correcting its efforts to appeal to young audiences, meaning that older programs and services may bear the brunt of the cuts. The closure of BBC4 and the retention of BBC3 will support this narrative.

“They are so obsessed with the youth here that sometimes they can’t see the forest for the trees,” says a source.

Content cut

Regardless of public opinion, the BBC will be forced to make significant content cuts this year.

It unveiled a stunning move on Thursday to cut 1,000 hours of shows a year as it struggles to meet an overall annual savings target that has increased by 40% to £400 million ($500 million) by 2027/28. Tough decisions lie ahead, the BBC said, as it cuts almost £100m from its TV budget alone.

Deadline understands that an informal review is currently underway, with commissioners examining mid-budget programs that are not breaking through as much as they would like. However, some of these programs will be deleted in the coming weeks autumn watch And Frankie Boyle’s New World Order was recently cut.

It appears that the first show in the era ended up on the annual schedule, a hit for the family comedy ghosts, surfaced this morning, although that decision was made separately from the 1,000 hours and was always intended to be completed after five seasons.