Series 1: 2009 The program premiered on 20 July 2009 and aired as a live broadcast on weeknights from 7:00 to 7:30 pm. The promos of the show used musical samples of
Hello from
The Cat Empire. The premiere episode featured
MasterChef Australia season one winner
Julie Goodwin and an interview with
Sienna Miller and
Rachel Nichols. During the first season Ruby Rose and James Mathison were credited as part of the main cast, though their contributions were often limited to guest appearances and pre-recorded interviews. During the 2009 summer, in order to increase the profile of the show, Monday and Friday episodes were extended to an hour and the program was repeated in a late night (11 pm) timeslot to attract late night viewers who may have missed the show earlier in the evening. In addition, from 30 November 2009, the show underwent a small visual revamp. With the lights getting brighter, the set was changed to accommodate a more "summery" feel with the background displaying a blue sky and the foreground featuring more orange and brown lighting, skewing away from the dark, night-time feel from the start of the show. New titles were also added to fit the feel. As of 8 February 2010, Channel 10 cancelled the late-night repeat of the show. Ten's summer late night repeats of
7PM were always a part of its strategy to win more followers for the show.
Series 2: 2010 For 2010's non-daylight saving time period, the visuals reverted to display a more night time feel or reflection, however not to the extent as was seen in 2009 with orange and brown lighting still accompanying the set. A large screen was also added to the background. In 2010, Carrie Bickmore and Charlie Pickering were nominated for the
Logie of Most Popular New Female and Most Popular Male Talent respectively. Ten announced in June 2010 that the series had been renewed for another year. On 20 July 2010, the show celebrated its first year on air with regulars
Kitty Flanagan and Steve Price and
MasterChef evictee, Alvin Quah. The celebratory show commenced with a look back at the shows first moments on air a year beforehand. For the week starting 27 December 2010, the show went into a summer series entitled
The Holiday Project. It lasted for five episodes (as this was the length of time the show took a break) and featured Charlie Pickering and Dave Hughes sitting in front of the set reviewing some of the more popular segments, news stories and events of the show in 2010 while infrequently crossing to the Ten News room for the day's headlines. Carrie Bickmore and all other guest presenters did not feature in the series.
Series 3: 2011 The show returned on 3 January 2011. However, due to the death of Carrie Bickmore's husband, guest presenters replaced her during January. Bickmore returned on 14 February 2011. George Negus effectively finished his stint as a regular guest panellist on the show in January 2011 when he began to host his new current affairs program,
6PM with George Negus (later
6.30 with George Negus). On 10 March 2011 it was revealed the show scored an exclusive interview with embattled US actor
Charlie Sheen to be hosted by Nova personality and
7PM Project regular
Scott Dooley. It was the only Australian interview with the star and also tentatively the last interview to be conducted with Sheen in light of his supposed breakdown after having his
Two and a Half Men contract terminated. The interview was shown on the show as an exclusive on 11 March 2011 with Dooley interviewed personally on the show the night before. The airing of the exclusive interview coincidentally occurred while Sheen's house was raided by police. In light of the
wedding of Prince William and Catherine Middleton, Ten aired a special wedding coverage special of
The 7PM Project titled
The Wedding Project that ran for an hour on 29 April 2011. It aired to lacklustre ratings. On 9 June 2011, "St Kilda Schoolgirl" Kim Duthie, who infamously told media that she had "slept" with AFL player agent
Ricky Nixon, appeared on the program in a pre-recorded interview in which she said that comments she made earlier in the day, when she told media that she was "lying" about her accusations. The interview made headlines when an off-air comment by Duthie stating that "everything [she] said, [she] lied about", referring to her interview with the show, was shown live during the episode after the airing of the interview. Approaching its second anniversary, the program scheduled numerous special episodes which were rumoured to have been scheduled to combat a drop in ratings due to strong competition. From 11 July 2011 and running for a week, various Australian politicians joined the panel and co-hosted an entire episode. Politicians included
Prime Minister Julia Gillard, MP
Bob Katter and Greens politician
Adam Bandt. For the week starting 18 July 2011, the program also invited members of the general public, who have strong opinions on various current events, to join the panel. On 18 July 2011, the program celebrated its 500th episode. It featured "Your Chair" panellist Louise Benjamin, Jennifer Byrne and all three regular panellists. Two days later, on 20 July 2011, the program celebrated its second year on air with "Your Chair" panellist Kim Forrester, Andrew Rochford and all three regular panellists. The show commemorated the tenth anniversary of the
September 11 attacks with a series of stories detailing how people affected by the event have coped over the past 10 years. Regular guest
Tom Ballard was given a regular Thursday segment entitled "Resident Expert" in September 2011. It is similar in style to Kitty Flanagan's Tuesday segment in which Ballard discusses a news story based on a recent scientific, statistical, social or medical study in humour. On 19 October 2011, Network 10 announced the program would be moved from 7 pm to 6:30 pm (replacing the axed
6.30 with George Negus), extended to one-hour and renamed
The Project. The first edition of the new hour-long program aired on 31 October 2011. As in previous years, Channel Ten continued to air
The Project over summer in a bid to gain more of an audience share, particularly due to the lack of other new content of rival networks.
The Project took a short break over the Christmas period and was replaced by a special "best of" series of the show, a compilation of episodes from the past year.
Series 4: 2012 The Project returned on 2 January 2012 with new episodes. On 22 January 2012, the show added a half-hour edition on Sundays which airs at 6 pm. The hourly editions aired on weeknights will also shift to 6 pm as of the following day, 23 January 2012, and remain at an hour in length. It will be the second move for the show in three months. In addition, the show has added a weekly weather update segment accommodated into its new Sunday show. On 14 February 2012 (Valentine's Day), actress and comedian
Magda Szubanski came onto the show to tell the panel that she 'identified as gay' in support for gay marriage. On the show, she said, 'I absolutely identify as gay ... and it must be hard for people who don't experience it to know what the pressures of being gay are.' On 8 March 2012, in addition to its regular episode at 6 PM, a special episode showcasing an unedited version of the movie
Kony 2012 along with some discussion was aired at 8 PM as part of the global social-network campaign phenomenon asking for the arrest of Ugandan rebels leader
Joseph Kony. The show was nominated for Most Popular Light Entertainment Program and Most Outstanding Light Entertainment Program in the
2012 Logie Awards. Newsreader Carrie Bickmore was nominated for Most Popular Television Presenter and the Gold Logie. These nominations were announced on 18 March 2012. From 24 to 29 June 2012,
The Project was broadcast from Sydney with stars such as
Carrie Underwood and
Katy Perry joining the panel at the desk for the first time. On 12 July 2012, Carrie Bickmore and her co-hosts became very emotional after airing a story about 31-year-old Queensland mother Emma Rathie who had been diagnosed with terminal cancer and whose son Blake had embarked on completing a 'bucket-list' of experiences that he and his mother could have before the end of her life. With donations and support via Facebook, Rathie and her son were able to experience several of the items on the list before her death in September 2012. On 7 August 2012, guest
Will Ferrell found himself speaking via video link to PM Julia Gillard. Unsure of how to address the prime minister, Ferrell asked 'can I just call you Jules?'. He then proceeded to ask Gillard for advice on how to improve his hair, to which she suggested that he take himself to a hair-dresser right away and spend 'buckets and buckets of money on in-salon treatments'. Pickering took time off in late October to cover the US election and for personal leave. Hughes will take leave in December. On 29 August 2012, Carrie Bickmore mispronounced the word 'Qantas' as 'Cuntas' during a reading of the news headlines. (The first syllable of the mispronounced word sounded too vulgar for broadcast.) The incident went viral with a YouTube video of the moment garnering more than 250,000 views. On 25 November 2012, the final half-hour Sunday edition aired and it was hosted by Carrie Bickmore and Andrew Rochford along with panellists
Magdalena Roze and Anthony 'Lehmo' Lehmann. During 2012,
The Project were awarded numerous awards, including the Yooralla Media Award of Distinction at the National Disability Awards. With the axing of
Breakfast, the encores of
The Project moved from 5 am weekday mornings to following the TEN Late News.
Series 5: 2013 The Project returned with new episodes on 31 December 2012 for its 2013 season. It was the first time the show had begun a new season before the new year, and the first time episodes had been broadcast on New Year's Eve and Day. In response to the 2013 Queensland Floods, on 28 January
The Project aired a separate live edition special into the state of Queensland. As Queenslanders usually watch
The Project on a one-hour delay (due to time zones), this meant that the team could tape a separate live edition of the show immediately after the main show and still air it in Queensland at the usual time of 6.30 pm. Due to these circumstances, the main show, which was still broadcast to the rest of Australia that night, did not air in Queensland.
The Project was nominated for three Logie Awards at the
2013 ceremony with newsreader Bickmore again picking up two nominations for the Gold Logie and Silver Logie for Most Popular Presenter, and the show earning a nomination in the Most Popular Light Entertainment Program category. Bickmore nor
The Project won either category. On Tuesday, 9 April,
Sex Pistols star
John Lydon caused controversy after his erratic behaviour during an interview. When host Carrie Bickmore asked him about his views on the recent death of
Margaret Thatcher, Lydon told her to shut up continuously before telling her that 'when a man is talking, you don't interrupt', a quote that drew considerable gasps from the audience. Bickmore apologised and asked him the question again, however this time Lydon accused her of being an 'in-dreadfully loud bird' he doesn't like. Bickmore aired her offence at the comment, however Lydon continued to tell her how loud she was being and how she shouldn't be 'yelling' and should 'learn what manners and respect is', drawing more gasps from the audience. After rejecting Bickmore's request to ask the question a third time, telling her to 'taper her voice' down 'a couple of thousand notches', fellow co-host Andrew Rochford stepped in, even trying to ask if Lydon's rant was based on Bickmore's gender, however Lydon accused the panel of yelling into his earpiece 'like excitable children'. He began to get arrogant and erratic, and after a heckle from co-host Dave Hughes, Bickmore tried asking the question one more time. When Lydon continually made jibes about the volume of her, and the other hosts' voice, Dave Hughes swiftly ended the interview by thanking Lydon for his time, however he left the interview telling the panel that they're 'done'. Bickmore has since admitted that she wanted to scream at Lydon after his sexist remarks, agreeing with Rochford's claim that Lydon was a misogynist pig. The show's 1,000th episode went to air on 30 April 2013. On 2 May, Carrie Bickmore became emotional when speaking about the awareness of brain cancer following a story about a potential cure for the disease in ten years' time. Bickmore lost her husband to brain cancer in 2010 and this episode marked the first time Bickmore addressed her own experiences with the illness on-air. Bickmore stated that she didn't "think people realize the mental and physical impact that it has on people, on patients, over a long period of time as the disease progresses." While it wasn't the first time Bickmore has broken down on air, this moment was highly publicized due to the context. On Saturday 7 September, the program aired an election special titled
The Election Project with Hugh Riminton. This is the second election
The Project has covered the election, however this edition ran from the time the booths closed on the Eastern Seaboard until approximately 10.30 pm when the majority of polling results were locked in. Despite time differences across the country,
The Project aired live into all markets, starting earlier for states away from the Eastern Seaboard. This is opposed to the one-hour edition of the show that ran during the 2010 election, half an hour of which did not air in South Australia and none of which aired in Western Australia. The 4-hour and 20-minute broadcast of
The Project was the show's longest in its history. On 1 November, British singer and presenter
Melanie Brown was forced to cancel a planned appearance on
The Project as a guest co-host after Ch-7 threatened legal action against her, citing that Brown was still under contract with Seven and not authorised to make appearances on rival networks. On 24 November, US actor-comedian
Will Ferrell was a guest co-host appearing in character as newsreader Ron Burgundy from the film
Anchorman 2: The Legend Continues which Ferrell was visiting Australia to promote. Burgundy traded quips with co-host
Ray Martin, saying that if the two were competing, he would take Martin out for lunch and cocktails and then sabotage the brakes on his car. On 8 December 2013, it was announced that regular host Dave Hughes was quitting
The Project in order to concentrate on his stand-up comedy routine with a national tour in 2014. The comments caused outrage from viewers who claimed the show's early-evening timeslot meant children were most likely watching at the time. The program apologised for the comments and the following night's broadcast included a 'live cross' to Santa in the North Pole. In December 2014, Waleed Aly was announced as the permanent co-host. He commenced in his new role on 26 January 2015.
Series 7: 2015 In September 2015, Andrew Guy became Australia's first openly transgender TV host, as a guest presenter on
The Project. In November 2015, Waleed Aly attacked the extremist group
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant in a five-minute piece titled 'What ISIL wants'. The segment was produced in the wake of the
November 2015 Paris attacks, with Aly labelling ISIS as 'bastards' and calling for everyone to come together as one against them. This video received strong media exposure, and many online views.
Series 8: 2016 Series 9: 2017 From 27 August 2017, the show began airing on Sunday nights for the first time since 2012. The new Sunday edition, entitled
The Sunday Project, does not feature regular hosts Waleed Aly or Carrie Bickmore, but instead features Peter Helliar with a rotating panel. In 2017,
The Sunday Project was hosted by Hamish Macdonald and
Chris Bath. In October 2017,
Network 10 announced that they had signed a contract with Lisa Wilkinson, who had left the
Nine Network after a contract dispute. Wilkinson joined
The Project as a senior host, editor and co-host of
The Sunday Project from January 2018. She also appears on the show 2 nights a week. On 20 February 2017 a
New Zealand version of
The Project premiered In New Zealand on Channel
Three. It follows the same format as the Australian version.
Series 10: 2018 Series 11: 2019 On 19 July 2019,
The Project celebrated its tenth anniversary with a 90-minute special in its 2700th episode.
Series 12: 2020 In January 2020, Peter van Onselen replaced Hamish Macdonald as host of
The Sunday Project and became a regular fill-in presenter for Waleed Aly. Macdonald will still feature on the show, amongst his ABC commitments. From 13 March, two days after the
COVID-19 pandemic was declared by the
World Health Organization,
The Project was filmed without a live studio audience, with restricted guest interviews and only three hosts live in the studio, the fourth host appearing by video link (with exception for Friday and Sunday episodes between mid-June and mid-August, the fourth host was sitting on an extra stool outside the bench), due to
social distancing laws in Australia.
Series 13: 2021 As of 2020–2021,
The Project has been filming without a live studio audience in Sydney and Melbourne.
Series 14: 2022 In March 2022, Carrie Bickmore announced that she would be taking a sabbatical from the show. Chrissie Swan and Georgie Tunny hosted the show in Bickmore's absence with Swan hosting Monday and Tunny on Tuesday and Wednesday. Bickmore returned in July. In August 2022, it was announced that Georgie Tunny will be joining the show as a reporter, producer and co-host. In October 2022, Bickmore announced her departure from the program at the end of the year. In November 2022, Wilkinson announced her departure from the program effective immediately. Shortly after Wilkinson's resignation, Helliar announced his departure from the show, with his last day being 7 December 2022
Series 15: 2023 On 23 November 2022, it was announced that Sarah Harris would replace Bickmore and join the panel in January 2023 to co-host five nights a week, from Sunday to Thursday. Harris would co-host alongside Waleed Aly, who would remain as a presenter from Monday to Thursday, whilst Hamish Macdonald would continue to co-host every Friday and Sunday whilst also reporting on stories from around the country. Reporter and producer Georgie Tunny was announced to be returning to the show in 2023, as a regular co-host on Friday nights. On 18 December 2022, it was announced that comedians Sam Taunton and
Michael Hing were joining the panel as regular co-hosts in 2023, replacing previous presenters
Peter Helliar and
Tommy Little.
Series 16: 2024 The Project returned in 2024 with all hosts returning. Sarah Harris dropped her hosting days from five to four per week, with Georgie Tunny now hosting on Thursday and Fridays.
Series 17: 2025 On 17 January 2025, Network 10 confirmed that Michael Hing would not be returning to the show as a host on Friday and Sunday nights. It was subsequently announced that the show would move to a three-host format on Fridays, with Rove McManus, Georgie Tunny and
Susie Youssef at the helm. Sam Taunton began hosting five nights a week to replace Hing on Sundays.
Myf Warhurst filled in for Youssef at the start of the year.
2025 Cancellation On 9 June 2025, Network 10 confirmed that
The Project would be replaced by a new current affairs program, as the network was preparing to phase out its long-running show. The final episode of the series aired on 27 June, with former hosts Carrie Bickmore, Dave Hughes, Charlie Pickering and Pete Helliar making guest appearances. Following the conclusion of the program,
The Project’s social media accounts remained active, promising to continue sharing content with daily posts. ==Special episodes==