7two is an Australian free-to-air digital television multichannel, which was launched by the Seven Network on 1 November 2009.[2]
The channel broadcasts a variety of programs, targeting a 25-and-over audience. 7two offers a broad selection of programs covering a variety of genres including lifestyle, drama, adventure, reality observational-documentaries and comedy.[3]
The channel was officially announced by the Seven Network on its breakfast program, Sunrise, at 7:45am AEDT 23 October 2009. Earlier, speculation suggested that Seven would launch its secondary channel around November 2009, with possible names including 7PLUS, PLUS7, Channel Mate and 7TWO. Seven's then-programming chief Tim Worner stated after the reveal that some of the potential names were red herrings to keep details of the channel a secret.[4]PLUS7 and Channel Mate (as7mate) were later used for Seven's internet TV catch-up service and Seven's second digital multi-channel, respectively.
The channel launched with the airing of a promotional video called "It's Time", featuring Seven Network personalities and clips of shows and movies intended to be broadcast on the channel, followed by normal programming. This video was also launched on the multi-channel's website and received cross-promotion on the primary Seven channel. The Seven Network continues its policy of cross-promoting each channel's content across all four channels (Seven, 7two, 7mate and 7flix) to this day. Seven presenters Tom Williams and Johanna Griggs initially served as the "face" of the channel and were seen presenting 7two's Friday and Sunday night lifestyle line-ups in early 2011.
The channel did not launch on the same day to many regional areas. 7two was launched for Southern Cross Television viewers in Tasmania and Darwin on 1 December 2009,[5][6][7] and for Prime Television viewers in Regional Victoria, Northern & Southern NSW and the ACT on 23 December 2009 from 9am. From launch, Prime broadcast the channel as '7TWO on Prime'.[8][9]
In January 2011, regional broadcaster Prime Television changed the name of its primary channel to 'Prime7', to reflect its strong relationship with its metropolitan partner, Seven. This led to Prime's transmission of 7two being rebranded as simply 7two, like the metropolitan counterpart.
In July 2020, 7TWO underwent a major rebrand, its first since its inception. The logo applies the same orange 7 ribbon logo but with TWO in lower case and the channel now referred to as 7two.
From launch, premiere seasons of previous Seven shows including Lost, Ugly Betty, Heroes and 24 were broadcast, along with a mix of other new and classic programming along with movies sourced from Disney.[10]
The weekday daytime schedule has seen numerous changes since launch as channel executives tried to find the right mix with viewers. At launch, 'Kid's Time' broadcast a block of children's programs each morning such as Yin Yang Yo!, and Digimon Data Squad, soap operas aired in the early afternoon and 'Kitchen Time' featured in the late afternoons with Essence of Emeril and The Martha Stewart Show among the programs broadcast. In 2010, soap operas including Shortland Street, Coronation Street and, briefly, Emmerdale and Hollyoaks joined classic Australian soap Sons and Daughters and early years of Home and Away into its mid-morning schedule along with early episodes of quiz show Deal Or No Deal. In early afternoon, a mix of repeated fare such as Mistresses, Murphy Brown, Doctor Finlay, and movies from the Sony Pictures library are shown. Occasionally, shows which first aired the previous night on the main Seven channel are encored on 7TWO during the day. While initially, dramas such as Grey's Anatomy were encored, more recently this has remained true only for Seven's local reality shows such as The X Factor and My Kitchen Rules. An early morning weekly omnibus of the previous week's new episodes of Home and Away airs on Sundays.
By the end of Summer 2010/11, 7TWO had proven itself to become the most watched multi-channel in the country dominating primetime slots with a total 6.4% audience share via the network across the 5 major cities and winning 9 weeks over 9Go!'s two weeks (one joint with 7TWO) which is largely attributed to the channel's increased broadcast of British-originated content across the week. In 2011, following 9Go!'s ratings share success (for digital channels) in 2010, 7TWO has stolen their crown as the number one multi-channel and the number one most-watched multichannel of the decade and century in Australia.
From launch until early 2013, 7two re-aired all daytime and prime-time national Seven News updates, no more than two commercial breaks after their original broadcast on the main Seven channel. These were all produced in Seven's Sydney news studio and presented by either Chris BathorMark Ferguson.
On 5 August 2013, a national news bulletin began airing on 7two, titled Seven News at 7, airing at 7:00pm Monday to Friday. It was presented by Melissa Doyle, with David Brown on weather.[18] Many months after the Nine Network's rival 7pm bulletin on 9Gem had ended, 7two aired their last Seven News At 7 bulletin on 2 May 2014.
7two televised live coverage of tennis tournament Wimbledon for the first time in 2011, first going to air at 8:30pm AEST on 7two whilst the primary channel continued normal programming before switching over to Seven at around 10.30pm. This practice has continued each year since.[19][20][21]
Between 2012 and 2018, 7two televised smaller tennis tournaments from Seven's Summer of Tennis, including the Brisbane International, Sydney International and AAMI Classic. This allowed Seven's main channel to continue with normal programming. Between 2015 and 2018, 7two started providing secondary coverage of the Australian Open for the first week.
Further sports coverage on 7two includes Horse Racing.
In 2010, 7two broadcast classic AFL and Australian Open tennis matches from the Seven archives between midnight and dawn.
7TWO began transmission on 1 November 2009. Following the launch, the logo uses the generic Seven logo in an orange colour scheme, with the word "TWO" being added next to it. Despite the main logo being slightly changed in 2016, this logo is still in use as a secondary logo. On 24 January 2016, to coincide with new on-air presentation, 7TWO modified their 2009 logo slightly by downsizing the Seven logo.
On 24 July 2020, just days after 7mate's rebrand, 7TWO unveiled their new logo for the first time since its launch in 2009. The word "TWO" is now in a different font with the letters becoming lowercase to be now known as 7two. It was part of the Seven Network’s major rebrand of their multichannels.
