Timeline Background In 1992, following the
Persian Gulf War, during which
CNN's position as the preeminent source of
24-hour news programming was cemented, the
European Broadcasting Union (EBU) proposed a channel to present information from a counterpart European perspective. Euronews was founded by a consortium of ten EBU members (national public broadcasters), titled
SOCEMIE (): •
CyBC, Cyprus •
ERTU, Egypt •
France Télévisions, France •
RAI, Italy •
RTBF, Belgium •
RTP, Portugal •
RTVE, Spain •
TMC, Monaco •
Yle, Finland The Swiss public broadcaster
SRG SSR was admitted later as a non-founding member. The
BBC and German public broadcasters
ARD and
ZDF opted not to join. The French city of
Lyon was chosen to host the broadcaster's headquarters, out of a variety of candidates also including
Munich,
Bologna and
Valencia.
Launch, geographic and linguistic expansion (1993–2015) The inaugural Euronews broadcast was on 1 January 1993 from
Écully, Lyon. In 1996, an additional broadcast studio was set up in London. In late 1997, the British news broadcaster
ITN purchased a 49% share of Euronews for £5.1 million from
Alcatel-Lucent. ITN supplied the content of the channel along with the remaining shareholders. A part-time Arabic-language service was briefly operated from April 1997, with a two-year grant from the
European Commission, comprising eight journalists and freelancers. After the tender expired, it ceased broadcasting on 15 April 1999. In 1999, the broadcast switched from solely
analogue to mainly
digital transmission. The same year, a Portuguese audio track was added. In 2001, the
All-Russia State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company (VGTRK) acquired a 1.8% stake in SOCEMIE. A Russian-language service was launched later in the year. In April 2003, ITN sold its stake in Euronews as part of its drive to streamline operations and focus on news-gathering rather than channel management. On 6 February 2006, Ukrainian public broadcaster
Natsionalna Telekompanya Ukraïny purchased a one percent interest in SOCEMIE. In 2007, Euronews won the European Commission's tender for an Arabic-language news channel, with a service agreement being signed on 6 December. A new Arabic service would eventually be launched in July 2008. On 27 May 2008, Spanish public broadcaster
RTVE decided to withdraw from the Euronews consortium, citing legal requirements to maintain low debt levels through careful spending and prioritisation of its
existing international channel as a factor influencing its decision to leave. In February 2009, Turkish public broadcaster
TRT purchased 15.70% of the channel's shares and became the fourth main partner after France Télévisions (23.93%), RAI (21.54%), and VGTRK (16.94%), while also joining its supervisory board. New language services included Turkish in January 2010, Persian in October 2010, and Ukrainian in August 2011. A short-lived Polish service was launched in mid-2011 to mark Poland's assumption of the
Presidency of the Council of the European Union, although only some selected evening broadcasts were translated. It was discontinued in January 2012. The service was briefly reestablished in September 2012 in the form of a 15-minute programme broadcast on private television channel
TTV three times a day during weekdays. The Polish service survived in this form until the end of 2013. The channel began broadcasting in widescreen in January 2011, in concert with
France 24. On 13 March 2015, it was announced that Inter Media Group, owned by pro-Russian Ukrainian oligarch
Dmytro Firtash, had purchased the Ukrainian service. In response, the government of Ukraine, citing suspected bias, revoked its broadcasting license and dropped its funding. Firtash later abandoned the project, resulting in the department shutting down and leaving 17 journalists redundant. The Russian service, which was financed by the
government of Russia, refused to provide jobs to the journalists, violating French labour legislation. The management explained that not hiring any Ukrainian journalists was a specific instruction from VGTRK. In October 2015, Euronews moved to a new headquarters complex in the Lyon district of , designed by Paris-based architecture firm
Jakob + MacFarlane and covering a floor area of 10,000 m2 (2 acres). The decision to move was announced in 2011, prior to the Media Globe Networks purchase. In 2016, Euronews SA was co-owned by Media Globe Networks, regional authorities (
Lyon Metropolis,
Rhône,
Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes) and the following broadcasters: •
ČT, Czech Republic •
CyBC, Cyprus •
ENTV, Algeria •
ERTU, Egypt •
ERT, Greece •
ETT, Tunisia •
France Télévisions, France •
PBS, Malta •
RAI, Italy •
RTBF, Belgium •
RTÉ, Ireland •
RTP, Portugal •
RTVSLO, Slovenia •
SNRT, Morocco •
SRG SSR, Switzerland •
TRT, Turkey •
TV4, Sweden •
TVR, Romania •
UA:PBC, Ukraine •
VGTRK, Russia •
Yle, Finland
NBC partnership (2016–2022) In November 2016, the channel's executive board was in talks with
NBCUniversal, the parent company of
NBC News, for a "strategic partnership". NBCU would acquire 15 to 30% ownership of the Euronews network, would contribute to Euronews content, and facilitate NBC News' expanded operations in Europe. After successful negotiations with the
European Commission, who feared that the partnership would result in an "Americanization" of Euronews, the NBCUniversal News Group finalised its purchase of a 25% stake in Euronews in February 2017 for €25 million ($30 million). NBC News president
Deborah Turness was appointed to head up international operations, and incumbent Euronews CEO
Michael Peters, who had led it since 2004, became CEO of the new partnership. Both reported directly to NBC News chairman
Andrew Lack. The resulting partnership became known as Euronews NBC. Although Naguib Sawiris and NBC News had the largest stakes in Euronews, editorial control by SOCEMIE members was assured, with the broadcasters having seven slots in the editorial board, as opposed to Sawiris' company (which has three slots) and NBC News, which only has one, thereby reducing rumors of an "Americanization" of Euronews' values. Editorial control is fully handled by Euronews' teams, with NBC only focusing on planning and coordinating tasks. After the formation of the partnership, video reports from NBC News' properties and correspondents began to appear frequently on the TV channel and reports from
NBCNews.com began to be distributed on its digital platforms. On 9 May 2017, Euronews began a process of splitting its services into twelve separate editions for each language, of which nine have a linear TV channel retaining their respective voiceover, but now including the on-screen ticker and most lower thirds in the local language. The
glocal strategy allows the language editorial teams to personalize the content and presentation of their channel, not only by sharing own-produced content with other languages but by producing content that is relevant to local audiences and allowing local reporters and presenters to appear on camera in all its language editions. The splitting process finished on 24 May 2017. The language split resulted in the discontinuation of satellite distribution for the newly-created German, Spanish, Portuguese and Turkish channels, now being only available via fiber-optic IP uplink. Additionally, the Arabic and Persian-language editions were relegated to an online-only distribution on Euronews' website and apps and major social media networks, with TV broadcasting being discontinued. This later also applied for the Turkish-language edition, following discontinued support from TRT, who wanted to prioritise its own international news channel,
TRT World. Finally, the Euronews channel in English would become known as the
World edition, and distribution to premises in the American continent via fiber-optic IP uplink was set to begin later in 2018. In 2018, Euronews' English-language channel began to gradually revamp its programming schedule, with the roll-out of a new slate of presenter-led programming to complement its already existing shows, a move that was reported earlier in the year, after the success of its presenter-led special reports and weekly programming introduced in recent years. Alongside conventional rolling news shows with newsreaders, debate programming, talk shows, and new presenter-led long-form shows began to be offered during the weekly schedule, and throughout programs, Euronews reporters from different nationalities will be offering context on stories close to their respective home nationalities. The roll-out began on 22 May, when Euronews debuted the first of these new shows,
Good Morning Europe, a five-hour morning show which airs every weekday morning from 7 am. It was first anchored by former
RT correspondent and
TVB Pearl news presenter Tesa Arcilla, who anchored it on a temporary basis. Some weeks later, former
France 24 presenter Belle Donati began presenting the show, alternating with Arcilla; after she moved to
Brussels in September, she became the main anchor of the slot. Two months later, on 17 July, Euronews debuted a six-hour breaking news show,
Euronews Now, anchored by Tokunbo Salako, covering the dayside and afternoon slots. On 3 September, the new evening program lineup was launched, starting with a politics-focused show,
Raw Politics, hosted from
Brussels by Tesa Arcilla, and featuring former
Sky News reporter Darren McCaffrey. It also spawned a weekly spin-off,
Raw Politics: Your Call, a phone-in show which featured European Parliament members answering viewers' questions by phone or social media. The show was dropped over a year later, in October 2019, due to low viewership, with its content being integrated into the rolling news programming. Two weeks after the launch of
Raw Politics, on 17 September, the full roll-out was completed with the introduction of a 5-hour evening rolling news show,
Euronews Tonight, initially presented by former
Sky News and
BBC News presenter
Sam Naz, and later by Euronews veteran Isabelle Kumar, who has worked with the channel since 2003. The traditional pre-produced blocks of video content still remained on some late-nights and weekends. Most overnights by this point repeated the previous day's edition (either full or half-length) of
Euronews Now. New weekly programming was also produced, including the weekly interview series
Uncut, which feature conversations from political leaders and newsmakers worldwide with minimum to no editing. The first episodes featured Franco-German politician
Daniel Cohn-Bendit interviewing former
UKIP leader
Nigel Farage and former UK Prime Minister
Tony Blair about
Brexit. Additionally, a new social media unit was created, with journalists with a background on digital news verification leading it. The newly created team helped to produce
The Cube, a social media segment during rolling news shows, focusing on analysis on treatment and reactions about news headlines on social media, with special attention at the major stories of the day.
No Comment, a long-standing element of Euronews' programming, remains on the channels' schedule, and it was gradually integrated into the rolling news shows on the English-language channel. Segments dedicated to Dubai were found to only have a brief sentence in small print indicating their sponsorship, which a Euronews spokesperson argued met French broadcast standards, rather than using the logo of the relevant institution as with other sponsored content. As part of Euronews' digital growth post-NBC, the broadcaster has launched a series of online verticals dedicated to specific areas. These include Euronews Green, Euronews Travel, Euronews Next, and Euronews Culture. In December 2021, reports surfaced that
Lisbon-based
Alpac Capital would buy an 88% controlling stake in Euronews from Egyptian telecoms magnate Naguib Sawiris. The sale was met with scrutiny as Alpac is allegedly linked to Prime Minister
Viktor Orbán of Hungary through Mário David (the father of Alpac Capital's CEO Pedro Vargas David), who is a long-time associate, advisor and friend to Orbán. The acquisition was partly financed by funds from the
Hungarian state, which asserted that the purchase would counter the media's "left-wing bias". According to Ágnes Urbán, director of the think tank Mertek Media Monitor, Euronews risked being exploited as a "pseudo-independent" media outpost of the
government of Hungary, where it maintains a semblance of independence, but takes a "far less critical" stance with regard to Hungary and other so-called
illiberal democracies. Euronews CEO
Michael Peters and several of the network's employees subsequently affirmed that the new partnership would not encroach on its editorial independence. The purchase was finalised in July 2022, following approval from the French government. Guillaume Dubois, a former broadcasting director at
LCI, took over as CEO in June 2022, prior to the purchase's completion. By the end of 2022, weekday news bulletins had gradually phased out all remaining in-vision presenting, reverting to the traditional voiceover format; some cancelled shows were reportedly still cited in programme guides. Four veteran shareholders within the network — founding public broadcasters France Télévisions, RTBF and RAI, as well as SRG SSR — had withdrawn from its capital by September 2022. As of July 2023, Euronews now lists only four shareholders on its "About us" page, with Alpac Capital's share at 97.6%. In early 2023, the channel's on-air identity and schedule was refreshed to mark the network's thirtieth anniversary, with less emphasis on in-vision presenting introduced in 2018. The on-screen branding, tailored to be optimised for mobile viewing, now includes a side strip of tweets sourced from different news outlets. In October 2024, Dubois was fired from his position as CEO and replaced by former Axel Springer Managing Director
Claus Strunz, with employees raising concerns over Strunz's pro-Israel and anti-immigrant stance on
Twitter. Unlike the previous incarnation, the new Polish service is to be a permanent addition as the 18th language, which in turn is to confirm the involvement of well-known Polish journalists in the project. The launch of the service again coincided with Poland taking over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union. On 10 June 2025, Euronews relaunched its Persian-language linear television service on online platforms, with broadcasting via satellite providers to be offered at a later date.
Former programming •
Good Morning Europe - discontinued from February 2023 •
Euronews Tonight – discontinued from February 2023 •
Prime Edition – discontinued from 2019 •
Late Edition – discontinued from 2019 •
Global Weekend – discontinued from February 2023 •
Raw Politics – discontinued from October 2019 •
Raw Politics: Your Call – discontinued from October 2019 •
Insiders •
Aid Zone •
Global Japan •
Notes from the USA Former radio service On 2 October 2012, Euronews launched Euronews Radio. The service was available for download on the App Store and Google Play, in addition to being available on
TuneIn, and was designed for viewers for whom "watching news is not an option" by providing a direct simulcast to the TV channel. To account for the radio format, "No Comment" segments were replaced by music and weather reports were read by a female announcer. The service was shut down in 2020.
Former logos Euronews logo (1993-1996).svg|January 1993February 1996: blue lower case word "euro" in a yellow parallelogram and yellow capital word "NEWS". Blank.svg|February 1996February 1997 Euronews logo (1997-1998).svg|February 1997October 1998: white lower case word "euro" above and blue lower case word "news" below. EuroNews.svg|October 1998June 2008: blue rectangle enclosing white camel case word "EuroNews". Euronews grey logo.svg|June 2008May 2016: white lowercase word "euronews" below a white circle. Euronews 2016 logo.svg|May 2016January 2023: silver-white lower case word "euronews", with "news" in a bolder font, followed by a small circle at the foot of the last letter. This variant, with a darker blue colour, was used from May 2016 until November 2022 online and until 31 January 2023 on-air. The current Euronews logo is a modified variation with a lighter blue tone. ==Organisation==