? FTA / FTV confusion?

pinkhelmets

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We often have threads with information that just confuses members even more on the subject of 'free channels' or 'freeview channels' on (sky) satellite platform. Hopfully this sticky will help.

FTA stands for 'Free-to-air' ~which means that the channel does not need a smartcard or a sky digibox, any digital satellite receiver is fine.

FTV stands for 'Free-to-view' ~the channel needs a smartcard and a Sky-branded digibox.

These abreviations- FTV & FTA are very much confused and used incorrectly.

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Some current popular channels that are FTA and dont need any smartcard whatsoever are as follows-

BBC1, BBC2, BBC3, BBC4
ITV1, ITV2, ITV3, ITV4 (plus all timeshift versions)
Channel4, Five, BBC HD, ITV HD, STV HD
Film4, E4, More4, (plus all timeshift versions)
True Movies1, True Movies2, Movies4men, Movies4men2, Men & Motors,
Zone Horror, Zone Thriller, Zone Romantica, Zone Reality, Zone Reality+1, Zone Reality X,
Chart Show, The Vault, B4, ChannelU, Fizz, Bliss, Scuzz, Flaunt, Rockworld, Bubble Hits, Big Box,
BBC News24, Sky News, Bloomberg, CNN, Euronews
CBBC, Cbeebies, CITV, Pop, Tiny Pop, Pop Girl, Kix!

plus many more low-budget like Life TV, Bonanza, Open Access2 and shopping or specialist chans etc.
plus well over 50 digital radio stations, far too much to list.

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Current FTV channels that require a 1-off payment smartcard and a sky branded digibox are-

3 regions of FIVE, FIVER & FIVE US (plus timeshift versions), Sky3, Liverpool FC TV, Viva TV, Channel4 HD, Five HD

There are 6 ITV1 regions on frequency 12402 (Astra 2 North beams) that are FTV.
There are 2 ITV1 regions on frequency 11973 (Astra 2 South beams) that are FTV.
ITV1 HD is also FTV on 11973.

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####NOTE. Some channels that are free on terrestrial freeview will require a monthly subscription to receive by satellite. Some of these examples worth noting are-

Abc1, The Hits, TMF, uktv bright ideas, uktv history
 
Last edited:
Thanks pinkhelmet for this informative post.
 
3 years later and someone finds it useful, thanks :)
Its a bit outdated really as we know have to add the HD channels. BBC HD and ITV HD are FTA (no card required) but CH4 HD is 'FTV' so a card is required, but you do not need a subsription.
Anyone want to add any other changes here? What else is FTA or FTV now?
 
well 5 is now fta,and setanta sports news is dead so no harm in removing it from the ftv channels
 
Currently FTV are

3 regional variations of Five
Fiver
Five USA (and timeshifts)
Sky 3
Liverpool FC TV
Viva TV
C4HD

You could also note that:

There are 6 ITV1 regions on frequency 12402 (Astra 2 North beams) that are FTV.
There are 2 ITV1 regions on frequency 11973 (Astra 2 South beams) that are FTV.
ITV1 HD is also FTV on 11973.

and Five HD will be FTV from Tuesday 13th July 2010.
 
This is useful to me as well. Thanks. Perhaps a table could be made that lists all the channels as rows and then Virgin Media M+, Satellite FTA and Sky FTV as columns?
 
It would be great if someone could make a list of all the channels that for sure
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Right thanks guys for adding info, I have updated the 1st post. Not sure its a help anymore, but if anyone makes a complete table of everything you are welcome to upload here. For now, this is as good as we got lol.
 
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