The station was founded on March 1, 1982, and first signed on in October 1986 as an affiliate of the Spanish International Network (the predecessor to Univision). It was owned by the Sainte Broadcasting Group, a company that was partially related to the present-day
Sainte Partners II, L.P. Pappas Telecasting acquired the station at the end of 1994 and converted it to an
English-language general entertainment station, taking the
WB affiliation when that network launched on January 11, 1995. When
Paxson Communications launched Pax TV in 1998, KREN took on a secondary affiliation with that network. In 2000, KREN lost the WB affiliation to the newly launched
cable-only
The WB 100+ channel known by the fictitious call letters KWBV ("WB6"). In 2002, the WB affiliation was moved back to KREN, effectively merging the two channels since KREN then took over the channel 6 position on cable. Pax TV's successor,
Ion Television, would not return to Reno until 2018, when
KTVN (channel 2) began carrying it on its third subchannel. The cable channel 6 position is now used by KRNS-CD. When The WB merged with
UPN to create
The CW in 2006, KREN became one of the charter affiliates of that network, with most of its programming provided by
The CW Plus. On May 10, 2008, 13 of Pappas' stations, including KREN-TV and KAZR-CA, filed for
Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Pappas cited "the extremely difficult business climate for television stations across the country" in papers filed with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in
Wilmington, Delaware. The company reported in court filings that it has more than $536 million in debt and $460 million in assets. Problems that led to bankruptcy included poor performance of The CW network, its now-former involvement with
Azteca América, and preparations for the 2009 analog shutdown. On September 17, 2008, bankruptcy trustee E. Roger Williams put KREN under contract to
Entravision Communications for $4 million, which doubled as a minimum bid for the station as it went up for auction in late October. Since that time, there were no suitable bids for either KREN or KAZR-CA, and Entravision officially assumed ownership on
April 1, 2009. On that day, Entravision moved Univision programming from KNVV-LP back to KREN's main channel while it moved The CW to what was then KAZR-CA (now KRNS-CD), thus displacing that station's former
TuVision affiliation. That station had been rebroadcast on KREN's second digital subchannel for some time before the sale to Entravision was finalized (and this arrangement continues to this day under Entravision). The affiliation switch effectively returned KREN to its Spanish-language roots. Around August 2009, KREN began to rebroadcast KNVV-LP (which became a TeleFutura [now UniMás] affiliate after the main KREN channel took over the Univision affiliation) on a new third subchannel. During Pappas' ownership, KREN's main digital signal was broadcast in
1080i HDTV with a
16:9 aspect ratio. However, when Entravision took over the primary KREN digital signal reverted to
480i SDTV with a
4:3 aspect ratio as all programs which aired on Univision at the time were still produced entirely in that format (and many such programs were produced in studios which still used analog video equipment rather than digital video equipment). However, as Univision transitioned to HD programming in 2010, KREN's signal remained in 4:3 SD until the spring of 2010 when the station's main signal was upgraded back to 1080i transmissions. ==News operation==