This artcle is about broadcaster. For other uses, see PBS (disambiguation).
''Public Broadcasting Service'' redirects here. It is not to be confused with Public Broadcasting Services, Public Broadcast Service, or Public Service Broadcasting (band).
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and television program distributor. It is a nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educational television programming to public television stations in the United States, distributing series such as American Experience, America's Test Kitchen, Antiques Roadshow, Arthur, Barney & Friends, Clifford the Big Red Dog, Downton Abbey, Finding Your Roots, Frontline, The Magic School Bus, Masterpiece, Mister Rogers' Neighborhood, Nature, Nova, the PBS NewsHour, Reading Rainbow, Teletubbies, and This Old House.
PBS is funded by a combination of member station dues, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, National Datacast, pledge drives, and donations from both private foundations and individual citizens. All proposed funding for programming is subject to set of standards to ensure the program is free of influence from the funding source.
Since the mid-2000s, Roper Opinion Research polls commissioned by PBS have consistently placed the service as the most-trusted national institution in the United States. A 2016-2017 study by Nielsen Media Research found 80% of all US television households view the network's programs over the course of a year. However, PBS is not responsible for all programming carried on public television stations, a large proportion of which may come from its member stations, including WGBH-TV, WETA-TV, WNET-TV, WTTW-TV, WHYY-TV, Twin Cities PBS, WHRO-TV, WPBT-TV, KGTF-TV, UNC-TV, Wisconsin Public Television, PBS Hawaii, KCPT-TV, American Public Television, and independent producers. This distinction regarding the origin of different programs on the service present a frequent source of viewer confusion.
PBS has more than 350 member television stations, many owned by educational institutions, nonprofit groups both independent or affiliated with one particular local public school district or collegiate educational institution, or entities owned by or related to state government.
PBS Satellite Service (Also known as PBS National or simply PBS Satellite. Formerly known as PBS Schedule X in Eastern Time, with the west coast delay signal designated PBS-XD) are feeds relayed from PBS by satellite. The Service provides a mixed variety of programming selected from PBS's regular network services. In the X/XD years a satellite feed was multicast by some PBS member stations on an over-the-air DTV subchannel along with their regular programming, or during overnight hours on their main channel to provide a second opporttunity for viewers to watch or record primetime programming.
As of 2018, the PBS satellite feeds can be received unscrambled using a free-to-air satellite receiver set to these coordinates:
- PBS at 125*W (on the AMC-21 satellite), K-band, unencrypted.
- LPB at 87*W (on the SES-2 satellite), K-band, unencrypted.
- PBS at 103*W (on the SES-3 satellite), C-band, unencrypted.
Currently, select stations broadcast the feed, usually overnight, like KGTF (PBS Guam, broadcasts most of the channel as a localised feed). The channel is also available over satellite providers like DirecTV (Channel:389). This channel is available to viewers of DirecTV (and other providers). PBS station provide all of their channels free to TV providers who do not receive local channels.
PBS Satellite Services is freely and nationally available from the designated K broadcast satellites using free-to-air satellite dishes as small as three feet, and from the designated C-band broadcast satellite (Scheduling).
PBS Kids weekday programming on the PBS national satellite feed. Local stations can air these programs live or tape-delay. Times are Eastern Time Zone (EST).