BBC World Service
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The BBC World Service is a British public service broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC. It is the world's largest external broadcaster in terms of reception area, language selection and audience reach. It broadcasts radio news, speech and discussions in more than 40 languages to many parts of the world on analogue and digital shortwave platforms, internet streaming, podcasting, satellite, DAB, FM, LW and MW relays. In 2024, the World Service reached an average of 450 million people a week.
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Key facts
- Type
- Radio broadcasting: news, speech, discussions, public broadcaster
- Country
- United Kingdom
- Availability
- Worldwide
- Headquarters
- Broadcasting House , London
- Broadcast area
- Worldwide
- Owner
- BBC
- Key people
- Jonathan Munro
- Launch date
- 19 December 1932 ; 93 years ago ( 1932-12-19 )
- Former names
- BBC Empire Service BBC Overseas Service External Services of the BBC
- Webcast
- Web stream
- Official website
- www .bbcworldservice .com
via Wikipedia infobox
~39 min read
Encyclopedic overview
The BBC World Service is a British public service broadcaster owned and operated by the BBC. It is the world's largest external broadcaster in terms of reception area, language selection and audience reach. It broadcasts radio news, speech and discussions in more than 40 languages to many parts of the world on analogue and digital shortwave platforms, internet streaming, podcasting, satellite, DAB, FM, LW and MW relays. In 2024, the World Service reached an average of 450 million people a week (via TV, radio and online).
BBC World Service English maintains eight regional feeds with several programme variations, covering, respectively, East and Southern Africa; West and Central Africa; Europe and Middle East; the Americas and Caribbean; East Asia; South Asia; Australasia; and the United Kingdom. There are also two online-only streams, a general one and the other more news-orientated, known as News Internet. The service broadcasts 24 hours a day.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “BBC World Service” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.