BritBox
BritBox is an online digital video subscription service, founded by BBC Studios[iii] and ITV, operating in nine countries across North America, Europe, Australia and South Africa.[3][4][5][6][7] It is focused on British television series and films, mainly featuring current and past series and films supplied from two British terrestrial broadcasters of the BBC and ITV (Channel 4 and Channel 5 programming are available on the UK service), in addition to original programming. BritBox is said to feature the biggest collection of British box sets available in one place, with additional original programming available from 2020.
Type of business
Subsidiaries (owned separately in the UK and internationally)
English
30 April 2024 (United Kingdom)
ITVX (UK)
9
- United Kingdom
- United States
- Canada
- Australia
- South Africa
- Sweden
- Finland
- Denmark
- Norway
- Reemah Sakaan
(CEO for BritBox International) - Emily Powers
(EVP & Head for BritBox North America) - Moira Horgan
(Country Manager for BritBox Australia)
Entertainment, Internet
- Streaming media
- Video on demand
- Film production
- Film distribution
- Television production
- Television distribution
- BritBox International: BBC Studios Global Media & Streaming[i]
- BritBox UK: ITV[ii]
- www
.britbox (Int.).com - www
.britbox (UK).co .uk
Required
2.6 million (July 2022)
7 March 2017 (United States)
Active
BritBox was first launched in the United States on 7 March 2017,[8] followed by a launch in Canada on 14 February 2018.[9][10] A separately managed UK service was launched on 7 November 2019.[11] From 2020, the service has since launched in Australia,[12] South Africa,[7][13] and in the Nordic countries[14] of Sweden, Finland, Denmark and Norway, through local partnerships in these four countries. The service in the UK and the international services are operated differently, and host differing content, including BritBox UK's exclusive original content. There are content restrictions between each platform, leading some content to be available on one platform and unavailable on another.
BritBox provides new episodes to British soaps and dramas such as EastEnders, Coronation Street and Emmerdale, within hours of their UK broadcast via BritBox's 'Now' feature to US and Canadian users, but also includes extensive archives of older programming, such as the popular Doctor Who classic series on the service. It reported a subscriber base of 250,000 within a year of launching in the US.[15] In 2019, 650,000 subscribers were reported from the North American platform.[16] In early 2020, the number of US and Canadian subscribers surpassed 1 million users,[17] to around 1.2 million by August, and 1.5 million by October,[18] following strong growth in the North American service due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[19][20] On 9 March 2021, it was reported that the UK service had surpassed 500,000 subscribers, meeting BritBox's UK target.[21] Will Harrison, BritBox UK's managing director told members of the UK Broadcasting Press Guild that BritBox was "very happy" at how the service had performed since its November 2019 launch.[22] By 1 July 2022, it had reached 2.6 million.[1][2]
Content[edit]
Original programmes[edit]
In September 2017, BritBox released a reconstruction of the Doctor Who story The Wheel in Space using the surviving episodes and reconstruction using Tele-snaps.[72] In July 2018, The Bletchley Circle: San Francisco made its debut, the first original drama series in which BritBox held a direct production role.[73]
More original content was set to be commissioned and produced for 2020, following the platform's UK launch, with the BBC stating "The first new show is expected to be commissioned soon and will be available to BritBox viewers from 2020".[74] The goal is to offer exclusive content only available on BritBox, rather than the BBC and ITV's UK VOD services BBC iPlayer and ITV Hub. The annual budget for original programmes was, according to BBC News, to be in the tens of millions of pounds.[75]
ITV pledged to invest up to £65m in the joint venture over the next two years to 2021, and the BBC said its own pledge would be in the "tens of millions".[76]
It was confirmed in March 2020 that the first original commission to be shown on BritBox UK would be a revival of the satirical puppet show Spitting Image.[77] The series, featuring 100 new puppets, debuted on 3 October 2020.[78]
In the table below, "exclusive" refers to a programme where it is only available on, whilst "debut" refers to the platform a programme is first available on.
Criticism[edit]
Excluded and controversial content[edit]
This may not apply to all platforms.
A big part of the BritBox catalogue is the extensive archives of the public service broadcasters, BritBox faces the challenge of hosting content that contains outdated stereotypes and opinions. In response to this, BritBox has announced that it would not include classic homegrown series that are deemed to be inappropriate for modern audiences.[125]
BritBox bosses have said a range of older shows, such as the BBC's Till Death Us Do Part and It Ain't Half Hot Mum, as well as ITV's Love Thy Neighbour, will not appear on the service because of content deemed racist or otherwise unacceptable.[126] Reemah Sakaan, the senior ITV executive responsible for launching the subscription video-on-demand service, said "We also recomply everything that goes on to BritBox [with modern TV viewing standards]. There's also the ability to create bespoke warnings around key programming."
Sakaan confirmed that Till Death Us Do Part, first aired on BBC1 in 1965, which features the bigoted character Alf Garnett, and ITV's 1970s series Love Thy Neighbour, a sitcom about a West Indian couple who move next door to a White British couple, will not appear on the service. Some individual episodes of the BBC's Only Fools and Horses and a Doctor Who serial from the original run (The Talons of Weng-Chiang, 1977) are also deemed problematic. In the Doctor Who serial, people of Chinese extraction are termed "inscrutable Chinks" and an English actor performs in "yellowface". Some Fawlty Towers episodes will run with warnings of offensive language. The Doctor Who serial from 1977 has a warning attached indicating "Contains stereotypes that some may find offensive."[126][127]
In June 2020, following the widespread George Floyd protests, shows like Little Britain were removed from BritBox, along with others, due to the use of blackface in the programme.[128]
Non-exclusive deals[edit]
The sale of rights to BBC and Channel 5 content has caused some reporters to be wary of BritBox's viability as a platform for new content, due to deals with larger SVODs to exclusively stream newer BBC content and non-exclusive deals with Sky and Now TV to access Channel 5 box sets.[129] However, many BBC Studios' deals have given licences to some of its content to many other SVODs on a non-exclusive basis. With newer or co-produced series more likely to be exclusive to certain SVODs, shown with the new 2020 original commissions being BritBox UK exclusive. Whereas Sky already has existing deals with not only Channel 5, but Channel 4 and the BBC to have certain box sets on their Sky and Now TV platforms in the UK.[130]
All current and future series of the 2005 revival of Doctor Who will be exclusive to stream on HBO Max (now Max) in the US, following a deal between the two, on 1 August 2019.[129] Other content from BBC Studios such as The Honourable Woman, Luther, Top Gear, and the British version of The Office would be available on HBO Max on a non-exclusive basis, meaning they would potentially be also available on BritBox.[131]
On 1 April 2019, a 10-year content partnership was agreed between BBC Studios and Discovery, which was to see Discovery become the exclusive global home of the BBC's landmark natural history programmes including the Planet Earth, Blue Planet and Life franchises for SVOD. The Dynasties series, hosted by Sir David Attenborough, is included in the deal, as are future BBC-commissioned landmark series. This deal applies worldwide except in the UK, Ireland and Greater China, meaning such series may be unavailable on BritBox platforms outside the United Kingdom. Upcoming co-produced content between Discovery and BBC Studios would be exclusive to Discovery's upcoming streaming platform outside the UK.[132][133]
The Discovery deal includes around 500 hours of non-exclusive content, which will still be available on other streaming services. A BBC Studios spokesperson told TBI that the relationship with Discovery is "very significant and important but it is not 100% exclusive on all titles in all regions and is, therefore, able to co-exist alongside regional deals of this type", following BBC Studios' deal to provide factual content to Greek telco OTE's pay-TV service Cosmote TV.[134]
Limitations[edit]
With limitations to its budget and original programming when compared to other SVODs, BritBox faces strong competition in the increasingly crowded streaming market. Critics warn that BritBox needs to greatly increase its financial firepower and original programming to compete in especially the UK market, against rivals, Netflix, Prime Video and Disney+, following reports more Brits would subscribe to Disney+ over BritBox.[135] Critics say that BritBox is no rival, and cannot rival Netflix without substantial resources. BritBox also faces direct competition with Acorn TV, an American streaming service that provides many British television programmes, among others, with the service recently launching in the UK.