Timeline of the introduction of television in countries
 | This list related to film, television, or video is incomplete; you can help by adding missing items. (October 2021) |
1939 and before
1940s
1950s
1960s
1970s
1980s
1990s
2000 and after
No television
No data
This is a list of when the first publicly announced television broadcasts occurred in the mentioned countries. Non-public field tests and closed circuit demonstrations are not included.
This list should not be interpreted to mean the whole of a country had television service by the specified date. For example, the United States, Great Britain, Germany, and the former Soviet Union all had operational television stations and a limited number of viewers by 1939. Very few cities in each country had television service. Television broadcasts were not yet available in most places.
History
1920s and 1930s
| Year | Countries and territories |
|---|---|
| 1928 |  United States (mechanical television, experimental)[1]
|
| 1929 |  United Kingdom (mechanical, experimental),[2]  Germany (mechanical, experimental),[3]  Australia (mechanical, experimental, after hours on two existing Melbourne radio stations),[4][5][6]  Netherlands (mechanical, experimental in Scheveningen)[7]
|
| 1931 |  France (mechanical, experimental),  Canada (mechanical only, experimental),  Soviet Union (mechanical, experimental),  Siam (mechanical, experimental, cancelled because of the revolution)
|
| 1934 | Australia (electronic television, experimental, Brisbane)[8]
|
| 1935 |  Germany (intermediate film; semi-electronic), France (electronic - PTT Radio Vision), Netherlands (electronic, experimental in Eindhoven by Philips)[7]
|
| 1936 | United Kingdom (electronic - BBC Television Service), Germany (electronic television - Deutscher Fernseh Rundfunk),[9]
|
| 1937 |  Free City of Danzig (electronic, experimental),[10]  Poland (mechanical, experimental), (Doświadczalna Stacja Telewizyjna) [11]
|
| 1938 |  Soviet Union (electronic, experimental),  Turkey (electronic, experimental)
|
| 1939 |  Chile (experimental),  Japan (electronic, experimental),[12]  Italy (electronic, experimental - EIAR Trasmissioni Sperimentali Radiovisione),[13]  Peru (electronic, experimental),[14] Poland (electronic, experimental)[11] United States (electronic; experimental and non-commercial until 1941 - NBC)
|
1940s
1950s
1960s
1970s
| Year | Countries and territories |
|---|---|
| 1970 |  Qatar (QTV),  North Vietnam (Independent Television System)
|
| 1972 |  Saint Christopher-Nevis-Anguilla (ZIZ),  Tanzania (TVZ)
|
| 1973 |  Bahrain (Bahrain TV),  Togo (Télévision Togolaise),  British Virgin Islands (ZBTV)
|
| 1974 |  Central African Republic,  Grenada,  Oman (Oman TV),  Kosovo (RTV Priština)
|
| 1975 |  Angola (TPA1),  Dominica,  Brunei (TV1),  Tuvalu (foreign-owned launching),  South Yemen, Vojvodina (RTV Novi Sad),  Burundi (RTNB)
|
| 1976 |  South Africa (SABC),  , Abkhaz ASSR (National Television of Abkhaz ASSR)
|
| 1977 |  Bahamas (ZNS-TV),[36]  Guinea (RTG)
|
| 1978 |  Afghanistan (Afghanistan National Television),  Benin (ORTB),  East Timor (TVRI Timor Timur),  Maldives (TVM),  Swaziland (Eswatini TV)
|
| 1979 |  Burma (test programming),[37] South West Africa (SWABC),  Sri Lanka (ITN Sri Lanka)
|
1980s
| Year | Countries and territories |
|---|---|
| 1980 |  Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG-TV), Burma (Myanmar Television, regular programming)
|
| 1981 |  Belize (Channel 7),  Macau (TDM),  Mozambique (TVM)
|
| 1982 |  Greenland (KNR),  Mauritania (TV de Mauritanie)[38]
|
| 1983 |  Antigua and Barbuda (ABS-TV),  Cambodia (as Kampuchea; re-established),  Mali (ORTM),  Seychelles (SBC),  Somalia (SNTV),[39]  Vatican City (Centro Televisivo Vaticano),[40]  Laos (LNTV) [41]
|
| 1984 |  Åland (TV Åland),[42]  Cape Verde (RTC),  Faroe Islands (SvF),  Nepal (NTV)
|
| 1985 |  Cameroon (CTV)
|
| 1986 | Mayotte (Mayotte La Première),  Niue (Television Niue), Wallis and Futuna (Wallis and Futuna La Première)
|
| 1987 |  Chad (Télé Tchad),  Papua New Guinea (foreign-owned launching) (EM TV),  Guinea-Bissau (Guinea-Bissau Television),[43][44]
|
| 1988 |  Lesotho (Lesotho Television) [45]
|
| 1989 |  Cook Islands (Cook Islands Television),  Western Samoa
|
1990s
| Year | Countries and territories |
|---|---|
| 1991 |  Cayman Islands (Cayman 27, now defunct),  Falkland Islands (FITV),[46]  Fiji (FijiTV),[47]  Guyana (NCN),  Nauru (NTV),  Rwanda (RTV),  São Tomé and Príncipe (TVS)
|
| 1992 |  Solomon Islands (TTV),
|
| 1993 |  Eritrea (Eri-TV),  San Marino (San Marino RTV),  Vanuatu (VTV), Western Samoa (SBC Television 1)
|
| 1995 |  Andorra (ATV),  Gambia (Gambia Radio & Television Service),  Kiribati (TV Kiribati),  Saint Helena (Sure South Atlantic Ltd),  Turks and Caicos Islands (Channel 4)
|
| 1996 |  Palau (OTV)
|
| 1999 |  Bhutan (BBS)[48]  Malawi (TVM)
|
2000s and 2010s
| Year | Countries and territories |
|---|---|
| 2000 |  Botswana (BTV),  Tonga (TV Tonga)
|
| 2002 | Kiribati (native, but suspended from 2013 to 2018)
|
| 2004 |  Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic[49] (did not start its regular programming until 2009. RASD TV)
|
| 2006 |  Comoros (ORTC)
|
| 2008 |  Liechtenstein (1 FL TV), Papua New Guinea (state-owned launching) (NBC Television)
|
| 2011 |  Norfolk Island (TVNI)
|
| 2018 | Kiribati (returned)
|
See also
- History of television
- List of years in television
- Geographical usage of television
- Prewar television stations
- Timeline of the introduction of color television in countries
- Timeline of the introduction of radio in countries
Notes and citations
- ^ See WRGB History, How Television Came to Boston: The Forgotten Story of W1XAY, W3XK: America's first television station, and "WRNY to Start Daily Television Broadcasts," The New York Times, August 13, 1928, p. 13.
- ^ See J.L. Baird: Television in 1932.
- ^ See Museum of Broadcast Communications: Germany and Berlin 1936: Television in Germany.
- ^ Australian TV – The First 25 Years by Peter Bielby, page 173. ISBN 0-17-005998-7
- ^ Linking a Nation – Chap 9 – Australian Heritage Council
- ^ Peter Luck, 50 Years of Australian Television ISBN 1-74110-367-3 p.15
- ^ a b c See Eerste NTS journaal op de Nederlandse televisie.
- ^ "Timeline – national and state, 1927-1941". Brisbane Courier Mail. Archived from the original on February 15, 2008.
- ^ See The Birth of Live Entertainment and Music on Television, November 6, 1936, and 1937 RCA Publicity Photographs. "Eighty-seven video programs were telecast by NBC last year," "Where Is Television Now? Archived 2008-09-13 at the Wayback Machine", Popular Mechanics, August 1938, p. 178. Regularly scheduled electronic broadcasts began in April 1938 in New York (to the second week of June, and resuming in August) and Los Angeles. "Telecasts Here and Abroad," The New York Times, April 24, 1938, Drama-Screen-Radio section, p. 10; "Early Birds," Time, June 13, 1938; "Telecasts to Be Resumed," The New York Times, Aug. 21, 1938, Drama-Screen-Radio section, p. 10; Robert L. Pickering, "Eight Years of Television in California," California — Magazine of the Pacific, June 1939. Also note that many rural areas of the Southern United States didn't receive television until the late 1950s and early 1960s.
- ^ Although 180-line cathode ray tube receivers were manufactured in France in 1936, a mechanical scanning camera was still used at the transmitter in Paris until 1937.
- ^ a b See The Warsaw Voice: What's On? and Historia Przemysłowego Instytutu Telekomunikacji przed II wojną światową at the Wayback Machine (archived September 28, 2007) (in Polish).
- ^ See The Evolution of TV: A Brief History of TV Technology in Japan: “Can you see me clearly?” Archived 2013-01-01 at the Wayback Machine; Public TV Image Experiments Archived 2016-05-26 at the Wayback Machine.
- ^ See Early Television in Italy
- ^ See Historia de la televisión en el Perú
- ^ Off from 1939 to 1945 during World War II.
- ^ Off from 1939 to 1946 during World War II.
- ^ ["Historia de la Televisión! | Primera transmisión en blanco y negro | Event view". Archived from the original on 2013-09-21. Retrieved 2013-10-24. Latin America's first experimental television station (in Spanish)
- ^ Czechoslovakia became two separate states, namely the Czech Republic and Slovakia in 1993.
- ^ See DRs historie 1950-1959.
- ^ Dutch-language BRT used the Belgian 625-line standard and French-language RTB used the Belgian 819-line standard (abandoned in 1963). Early Belgian sets were very expensive because they could receive four different standards: Belgian 625, European 625, Belgian 819, French 819. Later a fifth standard was added with the French 625-line standard.
- ^ a b The channel launched in 1956 as a continuation of a project that had aired a public broadcast in May 1955 as the first television broadcast in Finland. Keinonen, Heidi (2011). Kamppailu yleistelevisiosta. TES-TV:n, Mainos-TV:n ja Tesvision merkitykset suomalaisessa televisiokulttuurissa 1956–1964 (in Finnish). Tampere: Tampere University Press. ISBN 9789514483684.
- ^ Cheurfi, Achour (4 February 2011). Radio et télévision : histoire d'un monopole (in French). Algiers: Casbah Éditions (published September 2010). p. 88–p. 148.
{{cite book}}:|work=ignored (help) - ^ Herrera Palacios, Antonio (October 1998). "Un breve recorrido por la televisión en El Salvador" [A Brief Tour of Television in El Salvador]. Revista Latina de Comunicación Social (in Spanish). Retrieved 10 November 2021.
- ^ "¿Cómo fue la llegada de la pantalla chica a Panamá? - Nacional - title.suffix.trans".
- ^ The date refers to the launch of the television channel in republics and autonomous provinces of Yugoslavia, there were: RTV Zagreb in Croatia (1956), RTV Ljubljana in Slovenia (1958), RTV Belgrade in Serbia (1958), RTV Skopje in Macedonia (1964), RTV Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1969), RTV Titograd (Podgorica) in Montenegro (1971), and in Kosovo (RTV Priština) and Vojvodina (RTV Novi Sad) was introduced in 1975.
- ^ About LRT
- ^ Television was introduced in Hong Kong when it was a British crown colony until 1997.
- ^ Wales had received broadcasts from England since 1952.
- ^ Television was introduced in the Ryukyu Islands (now part of Japan) (OTV), when they were under U.S. administration.
- ^ The United Arab Republic was a short-lived political union between
Egypt and 
Syria. The union began in 1958 and existed until 1961, when Syria seceded from the union.
- ^ Ireland had received broadcasts from the United Kingdom since 1949.
- ^ Previously received television broadcasts from Italy.
- ^ This is the year when television was introduced in territories under its administration. After the Chinese Civil War in 1949, the government of the [[Republic of China (1912–1949)|]] retreated to Taiwan and other islands, and Mainland China was controlled by the People's Republic of China.
- ^ Gibraltar had previously received television broadcasts from Spain.
- ^ The Israeli Ministry of Education in co-operation with the Rothschild Fund started limited broadcasts to schools in March 1966. A public state-owned TV channel started broadcasting in May 1968. Broadcasts were black and white (with a few exceptions) until the early 1980s.
- ^ The Bahamas had previously received broadcasts from the United States.
- ^ Test service available only in Yangon in 1979, and formally launched in 1981.
- ^ عن المؤسسة - موقع التلفزة الموريتانية. tvm.mr (in Arabic). Retrieved 2018-10-25.
- ^ Louise M. Bourgault (22 June 1995). Mass Media in Sub-Saharan Africa. Indiana University Press. pp. 104–. ISBN 0-253-11309-1.
- ^ Although the Vatican did not have a television service of its own until 1983, broadcasts from Italy had been received since 1954.
- ^ Television is available from Nong Khai city in Thailand since the mid-1970s.
- ^ http://www.radiotv.ax/om-alands-radio (Swedish).
- ^ "Guiné-Bissau: Televisão celebra 17º aniversário com 14 horas de emissão". Agência Angola Press. 15 November 2006. Retrieved 9 October 2015.
- ^ LUSA (Agência de Notícias de Portugal, S.A.) (14 November 2007). "Único canal de televisão da Guiné-Bissau comemora 18 anos". Rádio e Televisão de Portugal. Retrieved 9 October 2015.
- ^ "LTV starts broadcasting for the first time - lesothotribune". 7 September 2022.
- ^ Television broadcasts had also been received from Argentina.
- ^ Television came to Fiji in part-time for the 1991 Rugby World Cup, and it arrived in full-time in 1994.
- ^ "Bhutan TV Follows Cyber Launch". BBC News. 2 June 1999.
- ^ "Sahrawis launch national television". Afrol News. 2009-05-21. Retrieved 2012-06-03.
