A pair of longstanding free-to-air channels will vanish from your TV Guide before Christmas. Bah humbug!
Parent company Native Entertainment has confirmed plans to pull its Pop and Tiny Pop channels from a variety of set-top boxes, including Freeview, Virgin Media, and Sky. The latter was already pulled from Freesat last year.
The Pop Player streaming service will also close down next month, Native Entertainment confirmed.
These free-to-air channels follow in the footsteps of Pop Max, which vanished from Freeview Smart TVs and set-top boxes in December last year. Pop has been a popular children's channel in the UK for over 22 years, having originally aired on May 29, 2003. Its sister channel, Tiny Pop, launched shortly after in July 2004, focusing on younger children. On the other hand, Pop Max, launched in 2008, would cater to older children.
After these channels officially leave, you'll only have the BBC, CBBC, CBeebies, and Channel 5's Milkshake! as the main free-to-air options to keep children entertained during the Christmas holidays.
The Pop Player is a free, UK-based streaming service and on-demand app that provided age-appropriate children's content
|POP PLAYER
The good news? These channels won't be gone for good.
From December 2025 onwards, Pop will become a streaming-only service on Freeview. So, instead of needing a standard aerial, you'll need an internet-connected Freview device to stream it.
LATEST DEVELOPMENTS
From December 2025 onwards, Pop will become a streaming-only service on Freeview.
| EVERYONE TV PRESS OFFICEPop's FAST (Free Ad-Supported Streaming TV) will also continue on Freeview, along with smart TVs such as the Samsung TV Plus. Although on Sky and Virgin Media, all Pop channels will shut down without an alternative viewing format.
Pop Player, which is an on-demand streaming app and website for the Pop channels, will be retired, including on all mobile devices, smart TVs, Freeview Play and the website.
Narrative Entertainment has said this decision comes as viewing figures have sharply declined over the years. Compared to a decade ago, the kids' TV sector is now worth about 4%.
Viewing behaviours have also changed over the years. For instance, children have been switching from traditional TV viewing to other streaming platforms like Netflix.
Narrative MD Paul Dunthorne told C21, "With commercial value across the UK kids’ TV market now just 4% of what it was 10 years ago, we’ve taken the decision to close our linear Pop channel at the end of the year.
“We understand the importance of offering high-quality kids’ TV, and we’ve done everything that we can to maintain Pop.
“But free-to-air channels for this audience are simply not commercially viable without public service broadcaster-style funding.
“We will retain our Pop presence on FAST channels in the UK on Freeview, Samsung, LG and other platforms, and internationally, as these continue to offer commercial opportunities.”
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