Digital
22 December 2020
  • 120 hours of content coming to STV’s digital platform for Christmas, with a further 150 coming in January
  • Leading video-on-demand service will now offer over 2,750 hours of exclusive content to viewers across the UK
  • A wave of new content and platform deals in 2020 have “elevated Player’s position in the UK VOD landscape” – Richard Williams, MD Digital, STV 
STV Player has announced five new deals which will see over 120 hours of new content being added to the free UK-wide service in time for Christmas, and an additional 150 hours coming early in the new year.
 
With TV consumption expected to increase this Christmas, STV’s VOD offering – which is the exclusive home of the Channel 3 network schedule in Scotland and offers a wide variety of Player-only programming to viewers across the UK – will be boosted by 18 new films from Reel One, including festive offerings A Christmas Hero and You Can’t Fight Christmas. Ten-part Canadian-American police drama Detective McLean, also distributed by Reel One, is AVOD-exclusive to the STV Player in the UK.
 
In addition:
  • A new deal with Espresso Media sees bingeworthy true crime series The Moors Murders joining the Player, alongside intriguing singles What Happened to Holly Bartlett? and My Dad’s On Death Row.
  • The Straits, a 10 x 60’ Australian drama series starring Succession’s Brian Cox, will also be available to enjoy over Christmas as part of a deal with DCD Rights.
  • 60 hours of new content comes courtesy of French distributor Balanga. A Tale of Two Thieves – a fascinating film exploring the Great Train Robbery of 1963 – leads the new additions, along with gripping science series On the Edge and Bon Appetit: Gerard Depardieu’s Europe, which sees the Hollywood star embarking on a gastronomic tour of the continent.
  • In January, Beyond Rights will bring an array of factual titles to the STV Player for 2021, including multiple seasons of true crime series Deadly Women, Cause of Death Unknown and Behind Mansion Walls, as well as reality formats Mother of the Bride and A Week to My Wedding. 
The new shows will bring the number of hours of Player-only content available on the platform to over 2,750. During a year of accelerated growth for the STV Player, online viewing increased by 82% from January to October (VOD viewing +87%; live simulcast viewing +71%), compared with the same time period in 2019.
 
Richard Williams, Managing Director of Digital at STV, said: “As 2020 draws to a close we’re delighted to have signed another wave of new content deals, which will bring even more high quality free TV from around the world into our viewers’ living rooms this Christmas.
 
“With audience habits rapidly changing, our strategy this year has focused on bolstering our catalogue of Player-only programming. The sheer wealth of content that we now offer, along with the fact that the STV Player has launched UK-wide on Sky, Freeview Play, Virgin Media and a plethora of other major platforms, has really elevated our position in the UK VOD landscape. I’m looking forward to building on that progress in 2021.”
 
The STV Player app is available on web, iOS and Android smartphones and tablets, Kindle tablets, Freeview Play, Apple TV, YouView, Samsung, Freesat, Fire TV, Virgin Media, Sky+, Sky Q and Sky Go, Roku, Now TV, and via Chromecast.
 
ENDS
 
Complete list of new STV Player titles:
  • Balanga
    • Bon Appetit: Gerard Depardieu’s Europe
    • The Case
    • Crime Scene Solvers
    • On The Edge
    • A Tale of Two Thieves
  • Beyond Rights
    • Behind Mansion Walls
    • Cause of Death Unknown
    • Did He Do It?
    • Deadly Women
    • The Ex Files
    • Handsome Devils
    • Hitched in Vegas
    • The Mistress
    • Mother of the Bride
    • A Stranger in My Home
    • True Medical
    • A Week to My Wedding
  • DCD Rights
    • The Straits
    • Thorne: Scaredy Cat
    • Thorne: Sleepyhead
  • Espresso Media
    • Losing Sight of Shore
    • Met While Incarcerated
    • The Moors Murders
    • My Dad's On Death Row
    • The Real Ayrton Senna
    • Student Athlete
    • What Happened to Holly Bartlett?
  • Reel One
    • Abduction of Angie
    • Amish Abduction
    • A Christmas Hero
    • The Christmas Cure
    • Detective McLean
    • A Family for the Holidays
    • A Housekeeper's Revenge
    • Instapsycho
    • Killer In Suburbia
    • Looks Like Christmas
    • The Missing Sister
    • Miss Me This Christmas
    • Mommy Would Never Hurt You
    • The Perfect Cheerleader
    • The Perfect Soulmate
    • The Psycho She Met Online
    • A Song for Christmas
    • You Can't Fight Christmas
    • 12 Days of Giving
​​
Media contact: 
​Stephen Innes - stephen.innes@stv.tv