Snooker viewing reigns: BBC Sport pushes the Snooker World Championship with more live coverage over more channels in 2026
BBC Sport, the long term host broadcaster for the Triple Crown, is taking on the Snooker World Championship at the legendary Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, UK [18 April to 4 May]. Supported by BBC Sport’s production partner for the Triple Crown, Sunset+Vine Scotland, and technical services partner Cloudbass, the three parties have now entered their second year of partnership.
Speaking to SVG Europe, Phil Bigwood, BBC Sport executive producer for football and snooker, says on World Snooker Tour’s (WST) Triple Crown and BBC Sport’s long running broadcast of the three top events in British snooker that, “in the modern world of so much changing, it’s great that BBC Sport is going to retain the Triple Crown events for the long term as well,” in reference to the broadcaster’s extended contract for the World Championship, UK Championship, and The Masters until 2032.
He adds that while linear TV audiences are in decline, BBC Sport has found that snooker is, “for some reason, a little bit of an anomaly”. He says: “If you look over the years, the figures have actually held up really well on linear year to year, which is an interesting one from our side, to be honest.
“We’re never going to get the 18 and a half million for Dennis Taylor and Steve Davis,” he notes on the 1985 World Snooker Championship final between Taylor and Davis which became a landmark in British television history, with 18.5 million viewers watching the conclusion for the title after midnight. This match still stands as the highest post-midnight audience in UK history and a record for BBC2. “But what is particularly interesting is that the iPlayer audiences nowadays mean the audience has become more familiar with where things are, and those [iPlayer] figures have really gone mad in recent years. In terms of the website attention, that’s been quite incredible really, because you think of snooker and the demographic that it would hit, but it seems to be really punching through.”
BBC Sport has tried over recent years to do more extended live coverage of the World Championship, and it is increasing that this year. Seen here, the commentary box at the Crucible Theatre in 2025
Evolving the game
BBC Sport has tried over recent years to do more extended live coverage of the World Championship, and it is increasing that this year. Within the World Championship production, Bigwood says there will not be major changes. instead those changes are coming about through increasing that live coverage and increasing what is available to view on BBC Sport’s various channels.
“It is more about what else can we do digitally and in different ways,” Bigwood says. “What is quite fascinating is that we did all of our background research on our facts and figures and the biggest performing thing digitally was when we had, Jude [Owens], a little boy that came out at the Crucible. He’s really, really young and that literally got hundreds of thousands of hits. It just shows the sorts of things that appeal to the audience. So we’re trying to think what else can we do over and above things like Shot of the Day or those quirky, funny moments? And therefore, whilst the TV coverage may be more traditional, it’s more on that side that we’re focusing now.”
The snooker players themselves are part of that wider digital coverage that will appear on BBC Sport’s digital channels. Says Bigwood: “We had a recent meeting in London with World Snooker Tour on building the personalities of players, because World Snooker Tour do a lot as it is. We’re working together to see what more we can do to build the personalities even more.”
Bigwood adds: “And then of course, like everybody these days, it comes back to balancing where we are with the budget, and how much can we innovate with what we’ve got available. If we’re doing more and more live play, then that obviously has an impact as well. So where do we prioritise and move things on?”
This clip of two year old Jude Owens doing a ‘walk out’ at the UK Snooker Championship 2025 on BBC Sport’s Instagram account is the third most viewed clip on the account with almost 20 million views. Sunset+Vine Scotland’s producer for the UK Snooker Championship in 2025, Amy Thabet, worked with the boy’s family to make it happen:
Maximum opportunities
Bigwood says one question that needs to be asked, however, is, “what do our audience want?”. He notes: “The priority will always be the live coverage, so there’s no denying that’s where we’re putting a lot of our focus. Unusually [unlike] most sports we cover, with the snooker we’re on BBC1, BBC2 and BBC4, as well as all iPlayer, so audience navigation’s a really key thing because without dedicated sport channels, we’re always going to have to move things around. As an example this year, [the World Championship is] on when the Women’s Six Nations is on and with England coming off the back of winning the World Cup, that’s a big priority for the BBC, and then obviously you’ve got all the normal football going on, hence navigation is a key part of what we’re trying to do.”
Comments Grant Philips, Sunset+Vine Scotland’s executive producer on the tournament: “A big priority that Phil and I work on closely together about is to get maximum airtime and the maximum opportunity for the audience. We’ve managed to do that again, as this will be on the BBC network of channels longer live than ever before. It’s constantly live across all the various BBC platforms, which is no small claim given that snooker’s been on the BBC for years and years and years.
“We’re still finding ways to hopefully push it forward and innovate, and we’re looking at all the various toys to try and bring them into snooker, but we think we’ve got the camera plan right and our priorities for live are right. That’s my belief for what we should be trying to do; worry less about gimmicks and more about the quality of the production,” concludes Philips.
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