Television in Uruguay

Analog television in Uruguay had a history of more than 50 years since it began in 1956, with the first television channel, Channel 10. Since then Uruguay has three other channels, Channel 12 Teledoce, Channel 4 Monte Carlo TV and Television Nacional Uruguay

Cable television

Cable television is largely controlled by the Equital conglomerate, founded in 1991, which is owned in equal parts by the three private television stations of Montevideo: Montecable (channel 4), TCC (channel 10), and Nuevo Siglo (channel 12). Each network owns a cable company: Monte Carlo owns Montecable, SAETA owns TCC, and Teledoce owns Nuevo Siglo. The tripartite conglomerate monopolizes pay television in Montevideo and parts of the inland, controlling at least one of the two providers available in Colonia del Sacramento, Salto, PaysandÃÂº, Treinta y Tres, Melo, Durazno, Minas, Rocha and TacuarembÃÂ³. Equital has been accused of cartelization and has been investigated by URSEC in the first half of the 2000s for collusion and price control. In 2024 the three companies were authorized to operate as a consortium

Digital television

On August 27, 2007, the Uruguayan government issued a decree stating that the DVB-T and DVB-H standards would be adopted. Uruguay hoped at the time for neighboring countries to reach an agreement on an HDTV standard, a process which took a number of years. On February 17, 2011, the government issued a new decree revoking the former one, and selecting ISDB-T as the standard to be adopted.

Brazil adopted the ISDB-T system in November 2007 after a very extensive and consistent study (executed by Mackenzie University and Television Engineering Association) where ISDB-T standard presented a more robust signal, more flexible services including mobile TV reception for free and excellent user interactive services. The implementation rollout through the country has been very successful. The prices of digital TV receivers and set-top boxes are rapidly decreasing.
In the late 2000s, Argentina was analyzing ISDB-T to verify if the standard also attends their needs. There is a wish to implement only one digital TV standard in all Mercosur Area, and if Argentina chooses ISDB-T it will be an important step for that integration (except for Uruguay and Colombia).
Uruguayan URSEC authorities provided no information on which road they would go until late in 2007. On August 27, 2007, Ursec settled on DVB-T and DVB-H. The TV sets being sold in Uruguay seem to be closer to ATSC HDTV-based standards (60 Hz systems, with ATSC tuners in some cases). Most of the DVD-based content in the country is NTSC/60 Hz-based, while the TV standard in use is PAL/50 Hz-based. Most of the analog TV sets sold are PAL-N, PAL-M and NTSC-capable, while most DVD players are multiregion. Authorities are not asking retailers to identify which standard the HDTV sets sold adhere to.
2010: All subscription television operators offer HDTV premium packages at varying prices. The offers rely on proprietary set-top boxes.

Channels

National

Regional

Each of the departments of Uruguay contain at least one television station broadcasting from within its territory. Each station airs its own productions and content, with some exceptions such as Canal 8 from Cerro Largo Department, operated by TelevisiÃÂ³n Nacional del Uruguay and the public channel of Montevideo, TV Ciudad also considering itself as the only network with international coverage, which is also available in Chile and Argentina (as a cable channel).