Swiss public broadcaster SRG will terminate the digital terrestrial distribution of its TV channels (DTT) via DVB-T nationwide on June 3, 2019.
DTT viewers will be informed about the switch-off, which was announced in September 2018, through a caption on the TV screens from January 2019.
SRG recommends affected households to switch to an alternative reception infrastructure, such as DTH satellite, cable, IPTV or internet streaming. In January 2019, a website with further information on the DTT switch-off will become available at www.dvbt-switch.ch; there will also be a telephone hotline.
From 3 June 2019, the former DTT channel slots will carry a slide referring viewers to the information website and the telephone hotline.
Under the new SRG concession, which will come into force on January 1, 2019, the right and obligation of SRG to broadcast its TV channels via DVB-T will end on December 31, 2019 at the latest.
SRG refers to the low use of the terrestrial network and cost-cutting measures as reasons for this decision. Only about 1.9% of Swiss households still use DTT, primarily for TV reception on second or third devices. SRG estimates that around 64,000 primary households will be affected by the switch-off.
In contrast to neighbouring countries Germany and Austria, Switzerland will, thus, not migrate to the more efficient DVB-T successor standard DVB-T2.
Switzerland will be the second European country in which a DVB-T network is switched off (and not replaced with a DVB-T2 network). It follows in the footsteps of Belgium, where Dutch language public broadcaster VRT has pulled the plug out of its DTT broadcasts on December 1, 2018.
