5 News

Why do channel 5 have two separate 30 minute bulletins so close to each other? I get the 5 news at 5 that makes sense. But what’s the point in 5 news tonight?

I wonder that too, especially when it competes against the popular ITV Evening News and BBC Regional News. It can't get many viewers, surely?

They have to air a certain amount of news in peak time.

This, and 6:30pm for them is the least worst time to do it. They tried 7:00 and 7:30 and it didn’t work. Channel 5 seem to like their 1 hour programmes in peak time and having their News at 6:30 seems to complement the schedule better.

Always thought their original 8.30pm slot was best. Evening shows, then news, then post-watershed / peak. Broke things up well.

I remember it doing appallingly at 8.30pm. Despite all the publicity generated about Kirsty Young ‘perching’ on the desk, ratings were as low as 200k. I think they get double that at 5pm now, 23 years later!

Just a shame it doesn't feel like the full service it once was. I used to quite often watch the lunchtime or evening bulletin and you were rarely more than an hour a way from the top of the hour 5 News Update, but now it's barely on my radar.

There was a time when 5 News had a niche in the market, but bar their USP of taking on the humanist stories there's nothing there that is a must watch.

It doesn't help that their lead presenter appears to only appear on-air twice a week from her makeshift studio.

This is exactly true. Their original incarnation of 5 News was unique and a very different style of presenting news that hasn't been seen in this country before or since. Ever since they had a proper separate studio, rather than being incorporated into the newsroom, it's lost all sense of purpose.

I don't recognise your description of 5 News being in any way related to the actual output I've witnessed. 5 News is essentially a regular, standard news programme, the likes of which you can watch an absolute ton of, on news channels and broadcasters in the UK and around the world. I would compare it to the likes of Global National, or Newshub. Very standard output generally. There's nothing to distinguish it from any other news programme, where as when it first appeared, it was very distinctive and very watchable. Now, I feel like it exists just to tick the requirement boxes, and not for any other reason.

Its interesting to think what a 2020 version of that original look would be like. Maybe not the hyper-colour graphics and stuff, but maybe the quick fast paced style, presented from the buzzing newsroom.

I know they try and tailor 5 News Tonight to a particular theme in the news, tonight's was billed as a Peter Sutcliffe special, but unless you watch the 5pm bulletin, you wouldn't know.

In the meantime, it needs another lead anchor with Sian reducing her time to a couple of days a week, the other presenters all blend into one. It's functional, tick box news that fills a quota. A shame as the original Channel 5 put news at the forefront of their output.