Knowledge Base

When the US switched from analog to digital OTA delivery in 2009 many broadcasters also switched the channel which they broadcast on over the air. Because broadcasters still wanted to be recognized by their original broadcast channel number referred to as their branded channel, a system was designed to allow broadcasters to alias the programs received by viewers to appear as their original branded channel number on TV's regardless of the channel they may be actually broadcasting their signals on. These aliased channels appearing on the TV using the broadcaster's original channel number are called virtual channels, and the actual channel they are broadcasting on is called the original or RF channel. In addition, by transitioning to digital, broadcasters gained the ability to broadcast several channels in the same bandwidth previously used for one analog channel. This is why virtual channels contain two numbers separated by a dot or period. The first number is the major channel number which is the same as the broadcaster original branded channel and the second number after the dot is the sub channel. Without virtual channels, viewers would not be able to find their favorite programs.