Film4 going Free-To-Air is an instant hit with Digital Viewers

Channel 4's decision to take Film4 free-to-air proved an instant hit with viewers: the channel enjoyed the most successful ever launch night for a new digital channel. 

The new channel won the best ever audience for a launch night programme with Lost in Translation which won an average audience of 735,000 (4.6% audience share of multi-channel viewing), peaking at 875,000 (5.2% share). The Oscar-winning film, starring Bill Murray and Scarlett Johansson, beat the record previously held by ITV4's debut night transmission of UEFA cup football on November 2005 which averaged 695,000.  It was also the most watched programme on a digital channel in multi-channel homes in its time slot (9pm to 11pm).

Film4 started transmission at 9pm on July 23rd and from then to midnight, the re-launched free-to-air channel was the most-watched digital channel in multi-channel homes and achieved the most successful ever debut night for a digital channel between 9pm and 12am, with an average audience share of 4.3%.  (In November 2004, ITV3 launched with 3.6%; in November 2005 ITV4 launched with a 3.2% share of multi-channel viewing between 9pm and 12am.)

The audience for the free film channel had a large number of younger viewers with more 16-34s watching Film4 (7.2%) than BBC2 (4.7%), between 9pm and midnight.

The daily share for Film4 beat the combined all day share for BBC3 (0.8%) and BBC4 (0.2%).

Head of Film4, Tom Sykes, says: "We've got off to a brilliant start. It's a testament to the strength of Film4's programming, the team behind it and the channel brand we've built over almost eight years, that such large audiences visited the channel last night at the first opportunity to view our films for free. I am delighted that we've been able to make this much- loved channel available at no extra cost to everyone in digital homes."