Free Channels on the Sky Digital Satellite Platform

Many people have asked for a list of free channels on the sky digital satellite platform. So I have produced a listing.

This list is aimed at UK viewers, viewers outside the UK without an FTV card will not get some of the EPG listed channels shown below.

FTA means Free to Air, No viewing card is required.

FTV means free to view, You need a viewing card, either a 2nd generation free to view card (Dark Blue) or a Sky Viewing Card. Free to view channels are only viewable on a sky digibox.

Free to view cards are available again:- http://www.freesatfromsky.co.uk/ By the way, skys "Freesat" is nothing more than what you see below it still does not include all the freeview channels (see my FAQ below).

Freeviews, some channels offer free viewing tasters at certain times of the day.

For a list of current test channels (which are often free to air while testing) click here.

Please don't email me with questions as I do not have the time to answer them, if you have a question, check out the digital spy forums there are lots of helpful experts there.

The BBC & ITV channels are all now Free to Air. Most of the subscription channels are now shown in the FTA EPG (Dead/No card inserted)  for some reason, but not CH4, or Five!

ITV London and Channel 4 London are now available on 993 & 994 throughout the country (except in london) to provide the audio description service (also available on five and BBC ONE London, SKY ONE and  BBC 2,3,4, CBBC and CBeebies)

Freeview Channels FAQ

A lot of people have been asking about the availability of the channels that are available on Digital Terrestrial Televsion (also known as "Freeview"). Unfortunately not all of them are free on Satellite for example:-

The Hits, TMF, Sky Sports News, UK History, UK Bright Ideas, FTN,  E4 & ABC1

To get all the above channels you have to get the Entertainment pack at £21.00 a month, (or at best £15 for the variety & music mixes which gets you The Hits, TMF, FTN,  E4, ABC1 + all the other variety and music channels)  and if you have not subscribed to Sky before, you are subject to a 12 month minimum subscription!  So you might as well get yourselves a cheap DTT box at £25+ and enjoy the channels for free forever. (If you are lucky enough to live in an area where you can get DTT!)

Also you get 3C Radio which is not available on sky at the moment.