NHK World-Japan (formerly and also known simply as NHK World) is the international arm of the Japanese public broadcasterNHK. Its services are aimed at the overseas market, similar to those offered by other national public-service broadcasters, such as the British BBC (BBC World Service, BBC World News, etc.), France 24, or the German DW. Contents are broadcast through shortwave radio, satellite, and cable operators throughout the world, as well as online and through its mobile apps. NHK World-Japan is also available on DirecTV channels 322 and 2049.[1] It is headquartered in Tokyo.
NHK World-Japan currently provides three main broadcast services: an English-language current affairs TV channel (NHK World TV), a multilingual radio service (NHK World Radio Japan), and a Japanese-language general/entertainment TV service (NHK World Premium). NHK World-Japan also makes most of its programming available through its website (either liveoron demand).[2] A Chinese version of the channel, NHK Huayu Shijie (NHK华语视界), which essentially provides news and select programs from NHK World-Japan with Mandarin dubbing and/or subtitles, was launched on January 15, 2019,[3] and is only distributed online.
The branch was rebranded from its former name of NHK World in April 2018.[4]
NHK World TV started broadcasting services for North America and Europe in 1995. On April 1, 1998, then-called NHK World Television started broadcasting. Today's NHK World-Japan is a current affairs and cultural channel that broadcasts internationally via satellite and cable TV. Programming is produced in English only. It began as a news channel in February 2009. NHK World-Japan's free-to-air broadcasts have been available in HD by satellite since then.
NHK World-Japan HD currently broadcasts from Intelsat 19 166°E, 68.5°E, Astra 19.2°E, Hot Bird 13°E, 58°W, to SES-3 103°W.[5]
Some of the shows are produced by production studio JIB TV, which is 60% owned by NHK with the remaining 40% owned by private investors like Microsoft and Japanese bank Mizuho. The NHK World-Japan digital on-screen graphic is not used at all when shows produced by JIB TV air as paid programming.
Biz Stream: A weekly business news program featuring the main stories of the week with guest expert analysis.
Cool Japan: Hosted by Shoji Kokami and Risa Stegmayer; some aspects of Japanese customs are considered "cool" by foreigners. Cool Japan is a television show that illustrates the quickly changing Japanese culture and how it is perceived by the international community that have recently made Japan their home.
J-Melo: A music program hosted by May J., featuring the latest developments in Japanese music, selections of hit songs, and diverse material from a wide range of different music genres: pop, rock, jazz, and classical.
NHK Newsline: A news program with updates every hour, covering world events and business-related news, as well as providing global weather forecasts.
Somewhere Street: A travel program which explores a different city each episode, from a tourist's perspective walking through a city.
Today's Close-up: A current affairs program from the NHK's domestic network
Most recently, NHK World-Japan has promoting selections of their J-drama lineups under NHK Drama Showcase.[7]
It is marketed with that very name in several regions of the world, including Asia, Oceania, Latin America and Europe. NHK World Premium's contents in Europe were previously shown on JSTV-branded subscription channels that were ran by NHK Cosmomedia Europe and headquartered in the UK. The service is known as テレビジャパン (TV Japan) in the US, which is run by NHK Cosmomedia America until the closure on March 31, 2024.[8] Contents generally do not carry English subtitles.
NHK World Radio Japan (RJ) is the international radio arm of NHK. It broadcasts a weekly lineup of news, current affairs, cultural, and educative radio program focusing on Japan and Asia, for a daily total of 65 hours of broadcasts.
Radio Japan provides two main feeds:
The General Service broadcasts worldwide in Japanese and English.
The Regional Service broadcasts to specific geographical zones in 17 languages: Arabic, Bengali, Burmese, Chinese, English, French, Hindi, Indonesian, Korean, Persian, Portuguese, Russian, Spanish, Swahili, Thai, Urdu, Vietnamese. Both services are available on shortwave (SW) as well as on the internet.[9]
