Television in Serbia

Television in Serbia was introduced in 1958. It remains the most popular of the media in Serbia—according to 2009 survey, Serbian people watch on average 6 hours of television per day, making it the highest average in Europe.[1]

## Free-to-air terrestrial television

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Headquarters of the national public media service Radio Television of Serbia (RTS)

Digital television transition has been completed in 2015 with MPEG-4 compression standard and DVB-T2 standard for signal transmission.[2][3]

### National broadcasting

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Serbia has a total of 7 national free-to-air channels, which can be viewed throughout the country. These are RTS 1, RTS 2 and RTS 3 from the country’s public network Radio Television of Serbia, as well as private channels Prva, B92, Pink and Happy. These free-to-air channels require a subscription, which is paid via the electricity bill.

### Regional and local broadcasting

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There are 28 regional and 74 local television channels.[4] Serbia’s northern province, Vojvodina, has a public broadcaster, Radio Television of Vojvodina. It airs 2 channels throughout Vojvodina – RTV1 and RTV2. Via pay tv services those 2 channels can be viewed throughout Serbia, like many regional broadcasters. One of the largest and most watched regional broadcasters is Studio B, which airs across Belgrade's metropolitan area.

## Pay television

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Some 67% of households are provided with pay television services (i.e. 38.7% cable television, 16.9% IPTV, and 10.4% satellite).[5] There are 90 pay television operators (cable, IPTV, DTH), largest of which are SBB (mainly cable) with 48% market share, Telekom Srbija (mts TV) with 25%, followed by PoštaNet with 5%, and Ikom and Kopernikus with 4% and 3%, respectively.[5]

### Cable television

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Nearly 39% of households in Serbia have cable television. As a result there are many cable television companies, by far the largest of which is SBB.[6] Cable operators offer not only Serbian channels in their packages but also foreign channels - on average there are 90 channels in basic cable packages.[5]

### Internet protocol television

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About 17% of households have IPTV.[5] First IPTV was successfully launched in 2008 by Telekom Srbija and its IPTV service, called mts TV, is today by far the largest IPTV platform in terms of numbers of subscribers. In 2013 SBB has launched an OTT service called D3i.

### Satellite television

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There are 10.4% of households equipped with satellite dishes.[5] Three dominant DTH services are: SBB platform called Total TV, followed by Polaris (owned by Bulgarian Bulsatcom) and Digi TV (owned by Romanian RCS & RDS).

## List of channels

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### Public channels broadcasting nationally

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Channel | Notes

|

RTS 1 | First television channel in Serbia launched on 23 August 1958 as Televizija Beograd or TVB (Television Belgrade).
RTS 2 | First colour channel in Serbia launched on the last day of 1971 as Televizija Beograd 2 (TVB2).
RTS 3 | Channel began broadcasting on 26 November 2008 in DVB-T format in Belgrade and Novi Sad area, since 21 March 2012 it was available across Serbia over trial DVB-T2 network.

### Private channels broadcasting nationally

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Channel | Notes

|

B92 | Launched on October 6, 2000. From 2017 to 2020, it was rebranded as O2.TV.
Happy | Happy is Serbia's youngest national broadcaster, launched on September 27, 2010.
Pink | RTV Pink launched on September 16, 1994 at 8pm. It has since become significant media group which owns several television networks across the Balkans.
Prva | Prva launched on December 31, 2006 at 7pm as FOX. It is part of Greek Antenna Group since December 2009. On September 20, 2010 at 6pm it changed its name to Prva.

### Public channels broadcasting regionally

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Channel | Notes

|

RTV 1 | First launched as Radio Television Novi Sad (RTNS 1) the network was renamed to Radio Television of Vojvodina in 2006. It is broadcast across Serbia's province of Vojvodina. It can also be seen throughout Serbia via pay television services.
RTV 2 | RTV 2 caters mostly for the minority groups living in the Serbian province of Vojvodina with a large number of foreign language content. It can only be seen in Vojvodina and is not broadcast via pay television services to the rest of Serbia.

### Private channels broadcasting regionally

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There are 27 private channels broadcasting with a regional licence.[4] Due to pay television services being widely used across the country, many local and regional channels can be viewed throughout the country.[7]

Channel | Notes

|

Regionalna TV | Airs from Novi Pazar
SAT TV | Airs from Požarevac
TV Banat | Airs from Vršac
TV Belle Amie | Airs from Niš
TV Bor | Airs from Bor
TV Enigma | Airs from Prijepolje
Info Kanal | Airs from Subotica
TV K23 | Airs from Subotica
TV Kanal 9 | Airs from Kragujevac
TV Kikinda | Airs from Kikinda
RTV Kragujevac | Airs from Kragujevac
TV Kraljevo | Airs from Kraljevo
TV Kruševac | Airs from Kruševac
TV Leskovac | Airs from Leskovac
TV Lav plus | Airs from Užice
TV Most | Airs from Novi Sad
TV Palma Plus | Airs from Jagodina
TV Panonija | Airs from Novi Sad
Pannon RTV | Airs from Subotica
TV Pirot | Airs from Pirot
TV Podrinje | Airs from Loznica
TV Raška | Airs from Raška
TV Santos | Airs from Zrenjanin
TV Studio MT | Airs from Leskovac
Sremska TV | Airs from Šid
TV Studio B | Airs from Belgrade
TV Šabac | Airs from Šabac
TV Vranje | Airs from Vranje
TV Vujić | Airs from Valjevo
TV YU Eco | Airs from Subotica
RTV Trstenik | Airs from Trstenik

### Domestic pay-tv channels

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* Arena Sport (available in HD)
* Sport Klub (available in HD)
* N1 (available in HD)
* Prva Plus
* Nova (Serbia) (available in HD)
* DM Sat
* Red TV
* Pink (Serbia)
* Nova Sport

### International pay-tv channels

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* Al Jazeera Balkans
* Star Channel (available in HD)
* Star Crime (available in HD)
* Star Life (available in HD)
* Star Movies (available in HD)
* Star Comedy (available in HD)
* AXN
* AXN Spin
* CBS Drama
* Comedy Central Extra
* Universal
* Sci Fi
* HBO (available in HD)
* HBO 2 (available in HD)
* HBO 3 (available in HD)
* Cinemax (available in HD)
* Cinemax 2 (available in HD)
* CineStar
* CineStar Action
* TV1000
* AMC
* Klasik TV
* Viasat Explorer
* Viasat History
* Viasat Nature
* Viasat Nature/History HD
* National Geographic (available in HD)
* Nat Geo Wild (available in HD)
* Da Vinci Learning
* Discovery
* ID X (available in HD)
* Discovery Science (available in HD)
* Discovery Showcase HD
* Discovery World
* Animal Planet (available in HD)
* Travel Channel (available in HD)
* History (available in HD)
* H2
* CI
* CBS Reality
* Nickelodeon (available in HD)
* Nick Jr. Channel
* Disney Channel
* Disney Junior
* Disney XD
* JimJam
* Minimax
* Cartoon Network
* Cartoonito
* Duck TV
* Baby TV
* Eurosport (available in HD)
* Eurosport 2 (available in HD)
* Eurosport News
* Extreme Sports
* Motors TV
* Motorvision
* Fight Channel
* Fight Sports (available in HD)
* Fight Network (available in HD)
* Outdoor (available in HD)
* Trace Sport Stars HD
* Fashion TV (available in HD)
* World Fashion
* FLN
* E!
* TLC
* 24kitchen (available in HD)
* Food Network (available in HD)
* Ginx
* MTV
* MTV Live HD
* MTV Dance
* MTV Hits
* MTV Rocks
* VH1
* VH1 Classic
* Trace Urban (available in HD)
* Trace Tropical (available in HD)
* Mezzo
* Mezzo Live HD

## Viewership

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Following is table of viewership for 7 national free-to-air channels:

Audience share % (4+)[8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15]

Channel | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 | 2009 | 2010 | 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023
RTS 1 | 19.5 | 20.1 | 22.4 | 27.4 | 26.5 | 26.2 | 26.0 | 25.1 | 23.6 | 23.6 | 19.9 | 21.7 | 18.5 | 19.2 | 20.2 | 19.4 | 19.3 | 18.4 | 17.6 | 17.5 | 16.3
RTS 2 | 7.4 | 8.2 | 6.3 | 6.7 | 6.8 | 7.6 | 5.7 | 4.6 | 4.2 | 3.6 | 3.0 | 3.1 | 2.3 | 3.1 | 2.5 | 1.9 | 1.6 | 1.2 | 1.2 | 1.0 | 1.0
Pink | 21.9 | 20.0 | 22.5 | 23.3 | 23.5 | 21.7 | 23.7 | 25.6 | 20.4 | 19.7 | 21.4 | 19.0 | 15.8 | 14.8 | 14.1 | 16.7 | 17.6 | 17.2 | 16.9 | 16.4 | 15.7
Fox / Prva | — | — | — | — | 4.7 | 6.4 | 7.8 | 10.6 | 15.1 | 16.1 | 16.0 | 13.2 | 10.7 | 9.7 | 9.0 | 10.9 | 10.5 | 11.7 | 10.7 | 10.0 | 8.1
B92 / O2.TV | 3.4 | 5.3 | 6.8 | 9.1 | 9.3 | 8.7 | 8.0 | 6.3 | 7.6 | 8.2 | 7.7 | 7.3 | 6.8 | 5.8 | 4.7 | 4.6 | 4.1 | 3.5 | 3.0 | 2.5 | 2.2
Happy | — | — | — | — | — | — | — | 5.4 | 4.3 | 2.8 | 4.1 | 4.7 | 9.8 | 7.9 | 9.4 | 8.3 | 6.9 | 6.8 | 7.8 | 7.9 | 7.5

## See also

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* Media of Serbia
* List of Serbian language television channels

## References

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1. ^ "Televizijske serije kao obrok". danas.rs. December 2009.
2. ^ Jovanka Matic and Larisa Rankovic, "Serbia", EJC Media Landscapes; accessed 11 March 2016.
3. ^ "Završena Digitalizacija!". Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2016-01-10.
4. ^ a b "Aktuelnosti statistike 2015" (PDF). webrzs.stat.gov.rs.
5. ^ a b c d e "Pregled tržišta" (PDF). ratel.rs. Republic of Serbia Regulatory Agency.
6. ^ "Pregled tržišta" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2018-05-08. Retrieved 2016-09-23.
7. ^ "Private television stations broadcast regionally". rrs.gov.rs.
8. ^ "Godišnji udeli u gledanosti najznačajnijih kanala u poslednjih 10 godina". rtvforum.net. Archived from the original on August 20, 2013.
9. ^ "Radio TV Forum-Mesečni i godišnji udeli u gledanosti za 2017". rtvforum.net. 4 January 2018.
10. ^ "Radio TV Forum-Mesečni i godišnji udeli u gledanosti za 2018". rtvforum,net. 22 January 2019.
11. ^ "Radio TV Forum-Mesečni i godišnji udeo gledanosti TV stanica u Srbiji u 2019. Godini". rtvforum.net. 3 February 2020.
12. ^ "Гледаност ТВ програма с националном покривеношћу у 2020". rts.rs. Archived from the original on 2 February 2021.
13. ^ "Gledanost TV programa s nacionalnom pokrivenošću u 2021". rts.rs.
14. ^ "Gledanost TV programa s nacionalnom pokrivenošću u 2022". rts.rs.
15. ^ "Gledanost TV programa s nacionalnom pokrivenošću u 2023". rts.rs.

## Further reading

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* Miroslav Savićević (1995). "Television". The history of Serbian Culture. Rastko.

## External links

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* Republic Broadcasting Agency Archived 2011-06-10 at the Wayback Machine
* ANEM - Asocijacija nezavisnih elektronskih medija

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Television in Europe

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States with limited
recognition|

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