Today the BBC have confirmed the date when they will be closing their Standard Definition (SD) channels on satellite, both Sky and Freesat

As the final part of the BBC moving all of its TV channels to be High Definition (HD) only, a process that was announced in late 2022, and took place in January to March 2023, , the BBC have been showing a caption on their SD channels informing viewers that the BBC SD channel swill be closing soon.

Speculation was that this would be by the end of

March 2024, but this has been brought forward as the BBCs Kieran Clifton, Director of Distribution & Business Development has said that demand for support had been “much lower than expected”. As a result, he said the BBC believed the number of homes still using SD-only equipment is “now far lower than anticipated”.

Today, 16th October 2023, the on screen caption on BBC One SD channel has been changed.

And the date of the BBC SD channel closure on satellite has been announced.

Click here to see the new caption and the date when the BBC SD channels will close on satellite.

If you are using an old SD Sky digibox, or watching SD channels because you are unable to receive the HD channels, then you only have a few months to rectify this should you want to continue watching BBC channels on satellite.

So, for example, if you are watching BBC One on Sky channel 801, then you need to make sure your satellite system is capable of receiving BBC One HD on 101. Otherwise you will lose access to BBC channels.

If you are in my service area, and unable to receive the BBC HD channels, then you may need :

– a HD satellite receiver
– a larger satellite dish (if your dish is smaller than the recommended 125x135cm size of satellite dish)
– your satellite dish / LNB realigned (if your dish is or is larger than the recommended 125x135cm size of satellite dish)

So please contact us to make sure you are still able to watch BBC HD channels after the announced BBC SD channel closing date.

Update: Some Sky HD boxes users are seeing an on screen message saying “For Your Information To Keep your BBC channels call us for a free upgrade”. This seems to be some sort of error (maybe the sky viewing card in the Sky HD box is still paired to an SD Sky digibox?), as BBC HD channels will NOT be removed from Sky HD boxes.