A news ticker (sometimes called a "crawler", "crawl", "slide", "zipper", or "ticker tape") is a horizontal or vertical (depending on a language's

writing system A writing system is a method of visually representing verbal communication, based on a script and a set of rules regulating its use. While both writing and speech are useful in conveying messages, writing differs in also being a reliable form ...

) text-based display either in the form of a graphic that typically resides in the

lower third In the television industry, a lower third is a graphic overlay placed in the title-safe lower area of the screen, though not necessarily the entire lower third of it, as the name suggests. In its simplest form, a lower third can just be text ...

of the screen space on a television station or network (usually during news programming) or as a long, thin

scoreboard A scoreboard is a large board for publicly displaying the score in a game. Most levels of sport from high school and above use at least one scoreboard for keeping score, measuring time, and displaying statistics. Scoreboards in the past used ...

-style display seen around the facades of some offices or public buildings dedicated to presenting headlines or minor pieces of news. It is an evolution of the

ticker tape Ticker tape was the earliest electrical dedicated financial communications medium, transmitting stock price information over telegraph lines, in use from around 1870 through 1970. It consisted of a paper strip that ran through a machine called ...

, a continuous paper print-out of stock quotes from a

printing telegraph The printing telegraph was invented by Royal Earl House in 1846. House's equipment could transmit around 40 instantly readable words per minute, but was difficult to manufacture in bulk. The printer could copy and print out up to 2,000 words per h ...

which was mainly used in

stock exchange A stock exchange, securities exchange, or bourse is an exchange where stockbrokers and traders can buy and sell securities, such as shares of stock, bonds and other financial instruments. Stock exchanges may also provide facilities for th ...

s before the advance of technology in the 1960s. News tickers have been used in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...

in countries such as

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

and

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

for some years; they are also used in several Asian countries and

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

. In the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

, tickers were long used on a special event basis by

broadcast Broadcasting is the distribution of audio or video content to a dispersed audience via any electronic mass communications medium, but typically one using the electromagnetic spectrum ( radio waves), in a one-to-many model. Broadcasting began ...

television stations to disseminate weather warnings, school closings, and election results. Sports telecasts occasionally used a ticker to update other contests in progress before the expansion of cable news networks and the internet for news content. In addition, some ticker displays are used to relay continuous stock quotes (usually with a delay of as much as 15 minutes) during trading hours of major stock market exchanges. Most tickers are traditionally displayed in the form of scrolling text running from right to left across the screen or building display (or in the opposite direction for

right-to-left In a script (commonly shortened to right to left or abbreviated RTL, RL-TB or R2L), writing starts from the right of the page and continues to the left, proceeding from top to bottom for new lines. Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Pashto, Urdu, Kashmiri ...

writing systems such as

Arabic script The Arabic script is the writing system used for Arabic and several other languages of Asia and Africa. It is the second-most widely used writing system in the world by number of countries using it or a script directly derived from it, and the ...

and

Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...

), allowing for headlines of varying degrees of detail; some used by television broadcasters, however, display stories in a static manner (allowing for the seamless switching of each story individually programmed for display) or utilize a "flipping" effect (in which each individual headline is shown for a few seconds before transitioning to the next, instead of scrolling across the screen, usually resulting in a relatively quicker run through of all of the information programmed into the ticker). Since the growth in usage of the

World Wide Web The World Wide Web (WWW), commonly known as the Web, is an information system enabling documents and other web resources to be accessed over the Internet. Documents and downloadable media are made available to the network through web se ...

, some news tickers have syndicated news stories posted largely on websites of broadcasters or by other independent

news agencies A news agency is an organization that gathers news reports and sells them to subscribing news organizations, such as newspapers, magazines and radio and television broadcasters. A news agency may also be referred to as a wire service, newswire, ...

Current uses

Television

The presentation of headlines or other information in a news ticker has become a common element of many different news networks. The use of the ticker has differed on a number of channels: * News networks and local newscasts commonly use a setup in which news headlines are scrolled across an area near the bottom of the screen, though some variations have formed, such as showing one headline at a time with a scrolling or "flipper" effect. * Financial news channels use two or more tickers displaying

stock In finance, stock (also capital stock) consists of all the shares by which ownership of a corporation or company is divided.Longman Business English Dictionary: "stock - ''especially AmE'' one of the shares into which ownership of a company ...

prices and business headlines. * Networks with a focus on

sports Sport pertains to any form of competitive physical activity or game that aims to use, maintain, or improve physical ability and skills while providing enjoyment to participants and, in some cases, entertainment to spectators. Sports can, th ...

often use a slightly different system, where scores and statuses of ongoing and finished games are displaced one by one, along with minor sports highlights, statistics and sports news headlines. They are typically divided into categories devoted to specific leagues and events (with

college basketball In United States colleges, top-tier basketball is governed by collegiate athletic bodies including National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), the United States Collegiate Athleti ...

and

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

usually focusing on the top 25

ranked A ranking is a relationship between a set of items such that, for any two items, the first is either "ranked higher than", "ranked lower than" or "ranked equal to" the second. In mathematics, this is known as a weak order or total preorder of ...

teams on the

AP Poll The Associated Press poll (AP poll) provides weekly rankings of the top 25 NCAA teams in one of three Division I college sports: football, men's basketball and women's basketball. The rankings are compiled by polling 62 sportswriters and broadca ...

, occasionally supplemented by sections for specific

conferences A conference is a meeting of two or more experts to discuss and exchange opinions or new information about a particular topic. Conferences can be used as a form of group decision-making, although discussion, not always decisions, are the main pu ...

). * Some programs, including news-based programs emphasizing viewer interactivity, or special events, may also use tickers to display messages and reactions from viewers and others that relate to the program. These comments are often sourced from

social networking service A social networking service or SNS (sometimes called a social networking site) is an online platform which people use to build social networks or social relationships with other people who share similar personal or career content, interests, act ...

s such as

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

and

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

, typically curating comments from a specific page or

hashtag A hashtag is a metadata tag that is prefaced by the hash (also known as pound or octothorpe) sign, ''#''. On social media, hashtags are used on microblogging and photo-sharing services such as Twitter or Instagram as a form of user-generated ...

. Due to their current prevalence, they have been occasionally been made targets of pranks and vandalism. In one such example,

News 14 Carolina Spectrum News 1 North Carolina is an American cable news television channel owned by Charter Communications, as an affiliate of its Spectrum News slate of regional news channels. The channel broadcasts rolling newscasts 24-hours a day, seven days ...

allowed viewers to submit relevant information such as school closings or traffic delays via telephone or the Internet that would be incorporated into the ticker; the system was exploited in February 2004 to display humorous and crude messages, including the infamous "

All your base are belong to us "All your base are belong to us" is an Internet meme based on a badly translated phrase from the opening cutscene of the video game '' Zero Wing''. The phrase first appeared on the European release of the 1991 Sega Mega Drive port of the 1989 ...

". Some businesses and organizations have utilized tickers intended for relaying weather-related closings as a surreptitious source for free

guerrilla marketing Guerrilla marketing is an advertisement strategy in which a company uses surprise and/or unconventional interactions in order to promote a product or service. It is a type of publicity. The term was popularized by Jay Conrad Levinson's 198 ...

, proclaiming they were open rather than closed and giving their phone number if possible, allowing them to 'advertise' on a television station all day for free. Since then, many stations have required pre-registration of businesses or organizations with an authorized representative and a signed

affidavit An ( ; Medieval Latin for "he has declared under oath") is a written statement voluntarily made by an ''affiant'' or '' deponent'' under an oath or affirmation which is administered by a person who is authorized to do so by law. Such a statemen ...

on company

letterhead A letterhead is the heading at the top of a sheet of letter paper (stationery). It consists of a name, address, logo or trademark, and sometimes a background pattern. Overview Many companies and individuals prefer to create a letterhead template ...

affirming their authenticity, along with filtering out unfamiliar businesses and organizations, before being able to display their closing announcements. Stations also confirm all closings involving

school district A school district is a special-purpose district that operates local public primary and secondary schools in various nations. North America United States In the U.S, most K–12 public schools function as units of local school districts, wh ...

s with authorized officials to prevent situations in which students either show up to canceled classes in dangerous conditions, or do not attend school due to an erroneous, prank-submitted, or false listing.

On personal computers

Various applications have been developed over time to install news tickers on

personal computer A personal computer (PC) is a multi-purpose microcomputer whose size, capabilities, and price make it feasible for individual use. Personal computers are intended to be operated directly by an end user, rather than by a computer expert or tec ...

desktops using

RSS RSS ( RDF Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication) is a web feed that allows users and applications to access updates to websites in a standardized, computer-readable format. Subscribing to RSS feeds can allow a user to keep track of many di ...

feeds from news organizations, which are displayed in a fashion similar to those used by television channels but enable the user to access to underlying news stories, a feature not offered by traditional television channels. The

Bloomberg Terminal The Bloomberg Terminal is a computer software system provided by the financial data vendor Bloomberg L.P. that enables professionals in the financial service sector and other industries to access Bloomberg Professional Services through which use ...

and other

stock market A stock market, equity market, or share market is the aggregation of buyers and sellers of stocks (also called shares), which represent ownership claims on businesses; these may include ''securities'' listed on a public stock exchange, as ...

-tracking programs and devices also utilize tickers. A ticker may also be used as an unobtrusive method by businesses in order to deliver important information to their staff. The ticker can be set to reappear, stay on screen, or be put into a retractable mode (where a small tab is left visible on-screen). In the

, broadcasters have stopped using this technology as other forms of communications have become available and increased in popularity.

BBC News BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broadca ...

and

Sky News Sky News is a British free-to-air television news channel and organisation. Sky News is distributed via an English-language radio news service, and through online channels. It is owned by Sky Group, a division of Comcast. John Ryley is the hea ...

discontinued their respective desktop tickers in March 2011 and 2012 to focus on other products, such as

smartphone A smartphone is a portable computer device that combines mobile telephone and computing functions into one unit. They are distinguished from feature phones by their stronger hardware capabilities and extensive mobile operating systems, whic ...

applications, to deliver updated information on breaking news and sport stories.

News tickers on buildings

Since the advent of the telegraph, newspapers commonly used their buildings to share the latest headlines. At first simple chalkboard signs were used for bulletins, but

limelight Limelight (also known as Drummond light or calcium light)James R. Smith (2004). ''San Francisco's Lost Landmarks'', Quill Driver Books. is a type of stage lighting once used in theatres and music halls. An intense illumination is created when ...

illumination, electric lights,

magic lantern The magic lantern, also known by its Latin name , is an early type of image projector that used pictures—paintings, prints, or photographs—on transparent plates (usually made of glass), one or more lenses, and a light source. Because a si ...

projections, and other novel techniques were later employed. The method of using electric lights to spell out moving letters was invented by Frank C. Reilly (August 20, 1888 – April 10, 1947) and patented in 1923. Reilly called his invention the Motograph. In 1928, ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...

'' installed a to display news headlines on the sides of

Times Tower The Times Tower, also known as the New Central Bank Tower, is an office tower in Nairobi, Kenya. At , Popularly known as the "Zipper," the sign remained in use until the building was sold in 1961. The sign was darkened during World War II to comply with wartime lighting restrictions. The Motograph operated until 1994 and was replaced by an electronic version in 1995, which was in turn removed in 2018 due to the replacement of all individual screens on the front of

One Times Square One Times Square (also known as 1475 Broadway, the New York Times Building, the New York Times Tower, or simply as the Times Tower) is a 25-story, skyscraper on Times Square in the Midtown Manhattan neighborhood of New York City. Designed by ...

with a 350-foot-tall LED billboard in 2018. Ticker displays appear today on the exterior of the News Corp Building, which houses the headquarters for

Fox News Channel The Fox News Channel, abbreviated FNC, commonly known as Fox News, and stylized in all caps, is an American multinational conservative cable news television channel based in New York City. It is owned by Fox News Media, which itself is owne ...

News Corp News Corporation, stylized as News Corp, is an American mass media and publishing company headquartered in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The second incarnation of the News Corporation (1980–2013), original News Corporation, it was formed ...

in the west extension of Manhattan's

Rockefeller Center Rockefeller Center is a large complex consisting of 19 commerce, commercial buildings covering between 48th Street (Manhattan), 48th Street and 51st Street (Manhattan), 51st Street in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The 14 original Art Deco ...

, as well as one that displays delayed stock market data that is located in Times Square.

NASDAQ The Nasdaq Stock Market () (National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations Stock Market) is an American stock exchange based in New York City. It is the most active stock trading venue in the US by volume, and ranked second ...

itself features a large display screen on the facade of the NASDAQ MarketSite building in Times Square. The

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency was estab ...

buildings at

Canary Wharf Canary Wharf is an area of London, England, located near the Isle of Dogs in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. Canary Wharf is defined by the Greater London Authority as being part of London's central business district, alongside Central Lo ...

and in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

have news and

stock ticker Ticker tape was the earliest electrical dedicated financial communications medium, transmitting stock price information over telegraph lines, in use from around 1870 through 1970. It consisted of a paper strip that ran through a machine called ...

s; the latter type features market data for the

New York Stock Exchange The New York Stock Exchange (NYSE, nicknamed "The Big Board") is an American stock exchange in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It is by far the world's largest stock exchange by market capitalization of its listed c ...

and

London Stock Exchange London Stock Exchange (LSE) is a stock exchange in the City of London, England, United Kingdom. , the total market value of all companies trading on LSE was £3.9 trillion. Its current premises are situated in Paternoster Square close to St Pau ...

, while the Toronto building's ticker also includes quotes from the

Toronto Stock Exchange The Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX; french: Bourse de Toronto) is a stock exchange located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is the 10th largest exchange in the world and the third largest in North America based on market capitalization. Based in t ...

. A red-

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor Electronics, device that Light#Light sources, emits light when Electric current, current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy i ...

ticker was added to the perimeter of 10 Rockefeller Center in 1994, as the building was being renovated to accommodate the studios for

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an Television in the United States, American English-language Commercial broadcasting, commercial television network, broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Enterta ...

's ''

Today Today (archaically to-day) may refer to: * Day of the present, the time that is perceived directly, often called ''now'' * Current era, present * The current calendar date Arts, entertainment, and media Films * ''Today'' (1930 film), a 1930 A ...

''. Placed at the juncture of the first and second floors, the ticker is visible to spectators in

Rockefeller Plaza Rockefeller Center is a large complex consisting of 19 commerce, commercial buildings covering between 48th Street (Manhattan), 48th Street and 51st Street (Manhattan), 51st Street in Midtown Manhattan, New York City. The 14 original Art Deco ...

and passersby on West 49th Street and updates continuously, even at times when ''Today'' is not being produced and broadcast. As of 2015, the ticker strip is only a small part of a large two-floor LCD video display that is placed within the window of the studio showing promotional information. The

Martin Place Martin Place is a pedestrian mall in the Sydney central business district, New South Wales, Australia. Martin Place has been described as the "civic heart" of Sydney.

Headquarters of

Seven News ''7NEWS'' is the television news service of the Seven Network and, as of 2021, the highest-rating in Australia. National bulletins are presented from Seven's high-definition television, high definition studios in Martin Place, Sydney, while f ...

, the news division of Australian television broadcaster

Seven Network The Seven Network (commonly known as Channel Seven or simply Seven) is a major Australian commercial free-to-air Television broadcasting in Australia, television network. It is owned by Seven West Media, Seven West Media Limited, and is one of ...

, also incorporates a ticker that wraps around the building.

By country

Asia

China

In the

People's Republic of China China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...

, state-owned

China Central Television China Central Television (CCTV) is a Chinese state- and political party-owned broadcaster controlled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Its 50 different channels broadcast a variety of programing to more than one billion viewers in six lan ...

uses a news ticker on its four television channels,

CCTV-2 CCTV-2 is a Chinese free-to-air Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the FTA Receiver, appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or liste ...

CCTV-4 CCTV-4 is a Chinese free-to-air television channel. It is one of six China Central Television channels that broadcasts outside the People's Republic of China. This channel contains a variety of programs including documentaries, music, news, dr ...

CCTV-5 CCTV-5 (), also known as the Sports Channel, part of the China Central Television family of networks, is the main sports broadcaster in the People's Republic of China. CCTV-5 began broadcasting on 1 January 1995. CCTV-5 now broadcasts 24 hours ...

CCTV-13 CCTV-13 (, China Central Television News Channel), formerly CCTV News (), broadcasting across China since 2003, is a 24-hour news channel of China Central Television and the biggest news channel in mainland China. Content CCTV News channel broad ...

and CCTV-News.

India

Almost all of the news channels based in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

use a news ticker, most of which display them in a two-band format, each of which have a different purpose. Some stations, such as Sahara Samay and News Live, use one of the horizontal ticker bands to display text advertisements. Most of the news tickers used in the country are structured as scrolls. One such exception is with

CNN-IBN CNN-News18 (originally CNN-IBN) is an Indian English-language news television channel founded by Raghav Bahl based in Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India. It is currently co-owned by Network18 Group and Warner Bros. Discovery. CNN provides internationa ...

, which uses both a "flipper" ticker for headlines and a scrolling ticker for stock quotes. During

breaking news Breaking news, interchangeably termed late-breaking news and also known as a special report or special coverage or news flash, is a current issue that broadcasters feel warrants the interruption of scheduled programming or current news in orde ...

coverage, CNN-IBN places an alternating "BREAKING NEWS" text and headline title on the upper band, with news updates regarding the news event on the bottom band. Some of the more tabloid-formatted news channels like

Republic TV Republic TV is a free-to-air Indian right-wing English-language news channel launched in May 2017. It was co-founded by Arnab Goswami and Rajeev Chandrasekhar, before the latter relinquished his stake in May 2019, leaving Goswami as the major ...

often feature a continuous, simplistic and alarmist presentation where the ticker is large and often accompanied by other tickers, along with a rolling

watermark A watermark is an identifying image or pattern in paper that appears as various shades of lightness/darkness when viewed by transmitted light (or when viewed by reflected light, atop a dark background), caused by thickness or density variations ...

for claimed news "exclusives".

Indonesia

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

, the country's first news-oriented network Metro TV is also the first to display continuous news tickers – a practice that is followed by all news networks within the country, such as tvOne,

BeritaSatu BTV, formerly known as Q Channel, QTV and BeritaSatu (literally translated as ''NewsOne'') is an Indonesian digital free-to-air news network owned by B Universe. The channel is the first Indonesia-based pay television channel. History BTV ...

Kompas TV Kompas TV is a national terrestrial private news television network in Indonesia. It is owned by the KG Media unit of Kompas Gramedia Group and is named after its flagship property, the ''Kompas'' daily newspaper. Kompas TV was founded in ar ...

, and

iNews iNews (short for ''Indonesia News'', formerly named SUN TV and Sindo TV) is an Indonesian free-to-air television network founded by Media Nusantara Citra, a subsidiary of Global Mediacom unit of MNC Asia Holding. It broadcasting 24 hours a d ...

. Other general national and local channels use a news ticker on an occasional basis, primarily on news programs to show updated news stories. On other programs, a ticker may be used solely for the purpose of providing information on breaking news stories or for text advertisements. During advertisements, Metro TV since 2010, including iNews TV (now iNews) from 2015 until 2017, always kept their news tickers, although Metro TV is sometimes removes its news ticker.

TVRI TVRI (, Television of the Republic of Indonesia), legally ( Public Broadcasting Institution Television of the Republic of Indonesia) is a public television network and the oldest television network in Indonesia. Its national headquarters is i ...

always show their news ticker except for sports or religious programs such as Friday prayer and Sunday afternoon mass.

Malaysia

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

, news tickers are utilized by

Astro Awani Astro AWANI is a Malaysian news organisation that broadcasts its news via Channel 501 on Astro. Since 2018, Astro AWANI has been consecutively recognised as Malaysia's most trusted news source by the Reuter's Digital News Report published by Re ...

(in the form of a "flipper" ticker) and

Bernama TV The Malaysian National News Agency ( ms, Pertubuhan Berita Nasional Malaysia), is a news agency of the government of Malaysia. It is an autonomous body under the Ministry of Communications and Multimedia. Bernama (usually stylized in all caps) ...

. The former keeps their ticker on-screen during commercial breaks, unlike that used by Bernama, as the case with those used during news programs broadcast on TV1, TV2, TV3, NTV7 and TV9.

Pakistan

GEO News Geo News is a Rank Number 1 Pakistani news channel owned by the Jang Media Group. History The Geo Television Network started out with the launch of its flagship channel Geo TV in October 2002 but has since launched several other channels whic ...

and

Dunya News Dunya News is a 24 hours Urdu language news and current affairs television channel from Pakistan. It is governed and operated by the National Communication Services (NCS) Pvt. Ltd. Its head office is situated at Lahore. Dunya News was founded an ...

use a single-band scrolling ticker (with white text on a blue background) that displays headlines in both

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

and

Urdu Urdu (;"Urdu"
''

ARY News ARY may stand for: * Abdul Razzak Yaqoob, a Pakistani expatriate businessman * Andre Romelle Young, real name of Dr. Dre * Ary and the Secret of Seasons, an action adventure video game * ARY Digital, a Pakistani television network * ARY Digital Ne ...

also uses a news ticker to display news headlines.

Philippines

In the

Philippines The Philippines (; fil, Pilipinas, links=no), officially the Republic of the Philippines ( fil, Republika ng Pilipinas, links=no), * bik, Republika kan Filipinas * ceb, Republika sa Pilipinas * cbk, República de Filipinas * hil, Republ ...

, tickers are featured during news programs by various networks including TV5; the state-owned PTV (which have a ticker even on the non-news programmes; until September 2020), Mensahe TV Media International Inc.,(Mensahe TV) and

Intercontinental Broadcasting Corporation Intercontinental Broadcasting Corporation (IBC) is a Philippines, Philippine State broadcasting, state broadcaster owned by the Government Communications Group under the Presidential Communications Group (Philippines)#Presidential Communicat ...

(IBC); and local news programs aired by domestic television stations

DWAO-TV DWAO-TV Ultra High Frequency (UHF) Channel 37 (analog) and Channel 38 (digital), is the flagship news and public service television station of the Filipino-based company Progressive Broadcasting Corporation (PBC), owned by Alfredo "Atom" He ...

("UNTV"),

DZEC-TV DZEC-TV, channel 25 (analog) and channel 28 (digital), is the flagship UHF television station of Philippine television network Net 25, owned by Eagle Broadcasting Corporation. Its studios, the analog and digital transmitter are located at EBC ...

("Net 25") and DZOE-TV ("A2Z"). *Radio Philippines Network the state-owned

Radio Philippines Network Radio Philippines Network, Inc. (RPN) is a Philippine Media of the Philippines, television and radio company based in Quezon City. It is the flagship media property of Nine Media Corporation of the ALC Group of Companies; along with the Pre ...

was the first

Philippine television Television in the Philippines was introduced in October 1953 upon the first commercial broadcast made by Alto Broadcasting System (now ABS-CBN), making the Philippines the first Southeast Asian country and the second in Asia to do so. Even b ...

network to incorporate a ticker within its news broadcasts (which are formerly featured on the news programs '' RPN NewsWatch'' and ''

RPN NewsCap ''RPN NewsCap'' is the flagship English late-evening news program of RPN. which was aired from November 30, 2009, to October 29, 2012, replacing '' NewsWatch: Second Edition''. This serves as a spin-off RPN NewsWatch. until it was axed in 2012 ...

''). *GMA Network

GMA Network GMA Network (Global Media Arts or simply GMA) is a Philippine free-to-air television and radio network. It is the flagship property of publicly traded GMA Network, Inc. Its first broadcast on television was on October 29, 1961. GMA Network (f ...

was the first

network to incorporate a ticker within its news broadcasts (which are currently featured on the news programs ''

24 Oras ''24 Oras'' (pronounced as bente kwatro oras / ) is a Philippine television news broadcasting show broadcast by GMA Network. Originally anchored by Mel Tiangco and Mike Enriquez, it premiered on March 15, 2004, on the network's Telebabad line ...

'', ''

Unang Hirit ''Unang Hirit'' () is a Philippine television news broadcasting and talk show broadcast by GMA Network. It is the longest running morning show in the Philippines. Originally hosted by Ryan Agoncillo, Lyn Ching-Pascual, Arnold Clavio, Suzi Entr ...

'' and ''

Saksi ''Saksi'' () formerly ''Saksi: GMA Headline Balita'' and ''Saksi: Liga ng Katotohanan'' is a Philippine television news broadcasting show broadcast by GMA Network. Originally anchored by Mike Enriquez and Karen Davila, it premiered on October ...

''). The network formerly incorporated traffic data provided b
Trapik.com
within the ticker in the early 2000s. During elections, GMA also utilized a ticker displaying updated vote counts, even during broadcasts of the network's

telenovela A telenovela is a type of a television serial drama or soap opera produced primarily in Latin America. The word combines ''tele'' (for "television") and ''novela'' (meaning "novel"). Similar drama genres around the world include '' teleserye'' ...

s with the help of PRiM Comms and Events, a third party PR and Media Company headed by its Media Director, Mr. Ralph Jasper Jose.

GMA News TV GMA News TV (GNTV; visually rendered in its logo in all capital letters as GMA NEWS TV) is a 24-hour Philippine-based international pay television channel owned by Citynet Network Marketing and Productions Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of GM ...

uses two types of news tickers: a silver version used for news programmes augmented with a black time bug on the left side of the screen; and a thicker white ticker for public affairs and entertainment programs (as well as the news program ''

Balita Pilipinas ''Balita Pilipinas Primetime'' () is a Philippine television news broadcasting show broadcast by GMA News TV. Anchored by Arnold Clavio, it premiered on March 5, 2011. The show concluded on February 15, 2014. Format The newscast was anchored b ...

'' before it was removed on the schedule in 2014) augmented with a red bordered clock on the left side. *ABS-CBN

ABS-CBN ABS-CBN (an initialism of its two predecessors' names, Alto Broadcasting System and Chronicle Broadcasting Network) is a Television in the Philippines, Philippine Commercial broadcasting, commercial broadcast broadcast network, network tha ...

began using a news ticker by 2003, with

ABS-CBN News Channel ABS-CBN News Channel, commonly known as ANC, is a 24/7 Philippine pay television news channel. It was launched in 1996 as the first all-news network in English language. The majority of its programs are produced by ABS-CBN News. The channel is ...

(ANC) launch its ticker in 2005, which is accompanied by a

PSE PSE may refer to: Companies and organizations Stock exchanges *Pacific Stock Exchange, stock exchange in USA * Pakistan Stock Exchange, stock exchange of Pakistan * Palestine Securities Exchange, stock exchange in Palestine * Philippine Stock ...

stock ticker on ''Mornings@ANC'' and ''Business Nightly''. The tickers used by ABS-CBN and ANC are also usually accompanied by a time bug placed on either the left or the right side of the bar, opposite the scrolling headlines (both often covered up by international broadcasters carrying it on a delay).

South Korea

South Korea South Korea, officially the Republic of Korea (ROK), is a country in East Asia, constituting the southern part of the Korea, Korean Peninsula and sharing a Korean Demilitarized Zone, land border with North Korea. Its western border is formed ...

KBS1 The Korean Broadcasting System (KBS) () is the national broadcaster of South Korea. Founded in February 1927, it is one of the leading South Korean television and radio broadcasters. KBS operates seven radio networks, ten television channels, a ...

KBS World KBS World is the Korean Broadcasting System's international broadcasting service. It consists of KBS World Radio, KBS World television channel and KBS Korea. History The foreign-language radio broadcast from KBS (before its restructure into a ...

and MBC TV each utilize news tickers during their news programmes, and in some instances, during non-news programmes. News tickers were first introduced in the country in 2001 by KBS1 and MBC TV for their morning news programmes. KBS World later introduced their own ticker in 2009 for its news programmes, including ''KBS World News Today''. KBS1 switch their tickers to a flipper effect in 2008, while the version used by MBC TV continues to utilize a scrolling effect until 2009, when MBC TV switch to a flipper effect. KBS World continues to using the tickers with scrolling effect.

Singapore

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

, CNA utilizes a news ticker normally consisting of a single banner graphic for general news headlines; a secondary yellow ticker replaces the main ticker during breaking news coverage.

Thailand

News tickers were first rolled on television in

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

in 2000. Previously Ch7HD implemented an Election results ticker in 1985 by Referenced score from Bangkok gubernatorial election, 1985 and stock ticker in the 1990.

Modernine TV MCOT HD (in Thailand called Channel 9 MCOT HD th, ช่อง 9 เอ็มคอตเอชดี) is a Thai free-to-air television network launched on 24 June 1955 and owned by MCOT. History The channel was originally launched as Chan ...

(Now as MCOT HD) implemented a stock ticker in the 1990, before introducing a separate ticker for news headlines on November 6, 2002.

Nation TV A nation is a community of people formed on the basis of a combination of shared features such as language, history, ethnicity, culture and/or society. A nation is thus the collective identity of a group of people understood as defined by thos ...

was one of the first news channels in the world to feature a specialized ticker to relay viewer comments via

in June 2009.

Vietnam

Vietnam Vietnam or Viet Nam ( vi, Việt Nam, ), officially the Socialist Republic of Vietnam,., group="n" is a country in Southeast Asia, at the eastern edge of mainland Southeast Asia, with an area of and population of 96 million, making i ...

, news tickers first appeared on domestic television on June 5, 2010, in VTV1's morning, lunchtime and evening news programs (accompanied by an updated time bug), as part of a visual overhaul that also included the introduction of a new graphics package, logo and newsroom. On other programs (including commercial), a ticker may be used for providing important warning or text advertisements.

Australia

, the first major use of news tickers occurred in the aftermath of the

September 11 attacks The September 11 attacks, commonly known as 9/11, were four coordinated suicide terrorist attacks carried out by al-Qaeda against the United States on Tuesday, September 11, 2001. That morning, nineteen terrorists hijacked four commercia ...

on the United States in 2001. Since the initial introduction, Seven Network and

Nine Network The Nine Network (stylised 9Network, commonly known as Channel Nine or simply Nine) is an Australian commercial free-to-air television network. It is owned by parent company Nine Entertainment and is one of five main free-to-air television netw ...

's respective morning programs ''

Sunrise Sunrise (or sunup) is the moment when the upper rim of the Sun appears on the horizon in the morning. The term can also refer to the entire process of the solar disk crossing the horizon and its accompanying atmospheric effects. Terminology Al ...

'' and ''

'' had retained their own tickers, although ''Sunrise'' changed theirs into a "flipper" effect while the ticker used by ''Today'' only displays weather forecasts for various Australian cities.

Sky News Australia Sky News Australia is an Australian news channel owned by News Corp Australia. Originally launched on 19 February 1996, it broadcasts rolling news coverage throughout the day, while its prime time lineup is dedicated to opinion-based programs f ...

maintained a news ticker that previously featured weather forecasts. Following an update to the channel's graphics package in 2012, the ticker switched to provide basic news and sport headlines, with weather forecast data docked on the left side and the current time for each time zone within Australia and

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

on the right. News tickers were also adopted for used by the

Australian Broadcasting Corporation The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) is the national broadcaster of Australia. It is principally funded by direct grants from the Australian Government and is administered by a government-appointed board. The ABC is a publicly-own ...

(ABC) for its ''Midday Report'' bulletin, and by Seven Network and Nine Network for their respective early-morning, morning and afternoon bulletins; while flipper tickers are used by

Network Ten Network 10 (commonly known as Ten Network, Channel 10 or simply 10) is an Australian commercial television network owned by Ten Network Holdings, a division of the Paramount Networks UK & Australia subsidiary of Paramount Global. One of five ...

for its early morning news program, ABC's ''

ABC News Breakfast ''News Breakfast'' is an Australian news breakfast television program. It is broadcast on ABC TV and ABC News channel from 6:00 am to 9:00 am AEST/AEDT on weekdays and is hosted by Michael Rowland and Lisa Millar. The program is also streamed ...

'' and news channel

ABC News 24 ABC News (formerly ABC News 24; also referred to as the ABC News channel) is an Australian 24-hour news cycle, 24-hour News broadcasting, news channel launched and owned by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. The channel replaced the forme ...

. The news service

Bigpond Telstra Group Limited is an Australian telecommunications company that builds and operates telecommunications networks and markets voice, mobile, internet access, pay television and other products and services. It is a member of the S&P/ASX 20 ...

introduced a news ticker on its website in May 2009.

Europe

Several

an news channels have used tickers as part of their on-air graphics packages for years, such as

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

news channel

n-tv n-tv is a German free-to-air television news channel owned by the Bertelsmann Media's RTL Group. n-tv broadcasts news and weather every hour and half-hour in the morning. It also broadcasts magazine shows and documentaries. History n-tv beg ...

, which has utilized a news ticker since it launched in 1992.

United Kingdom

In the

GB News GB News is a British free-to-air television and radio news channel. The channel is available on Freeview, Freesat, Sky, YouView, Virgin Media and via the internet. Since 4 January 2022, an audio simulcast of the station is available on DAB+ ra ...

and

use news tickers throughout their programming. The ticker used by BBC News, in particular, featured a dark red background with white

Helvetica Helvetica (originally Neue Haas Grotesk) is a widely used sans-serif typeface developed in 1957 by Swiss typeface designer Max Miedinger and Eduard Hoffmann. Helvetica is a neo-grotesque design, one influenced by the famous 19th century (1890s) ...

text – identical to that used by

BBC World News BBC World News is an international English-language pay television network, operated under the ''BBC Global News Limited'' division of the BBC, which is a public corporation of the UK government's Department for Digital, Culture, Media and S ...

– for general purposes, which is removed during programming promotions, countdowns and weather segments, and Headlines; while a lighter red version is used during breaking news coverage. Sky News' ticker is typically black text on a white background, with breaking news coverage being black text on a yellow background. GB News' ticker is black text on a white background, the same for breaking news, and is used 24/7, not being removed during advertising. In July 2019, BBC News converted to a black text on white background (or red for breaking news) flipper format.

BBC Three BBC Three is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the BBC. It was first launched on 9 February 2003 with programmes targeting 16 to 34-year-olds, covering all genres including animation, comedy, curre ...

's ''

60 Seconds ''60 Seconds'' is a short-news programme which ran between shows on BBC Three (and before that BBC Choice). It was broadcast under the BBC News format and branding. The presenters included Tasmin Lucia-Khan, Andy May, Matt Cooke, James Dagwel ...

'' news had a pink ticker throughout the course of the bulletin.

North America

United States

Though modern and efficient news tickers were not created and launched until the 1992 introduction of the "HLN SportsTicker" or fully popularized in the

until September 11, 2001, the first record of a news ticker being used as part of a regular broadcast was on

's ''

'', used when the program first premiered on January 14, 1952. Without the benefit of computer-generated headlines and

digital on-screen graphic A digital on-screen graphic, digitally originated graphic (DOG, bug, or network bug) is a watermark-like station logo that most television broadcasters overlay over a portion of the screen area of their programs to identify the channel. They are ...

s, the ticker was very different from the ones in use today. The ''Today'' ticker was an actual piece of paper with typewritten headlines superimposed on the lower third of the screen. The crude ticker was prone to breakdown and not clearly visible on the smaller screens of the time, and was dropped not long afterward. By the 1980s, in northern parts of the United States, many local television stations placed a ticker on-screen during local and network morning newscasts to disseminate information on weather-related school, church and business closings.

Severe weather Severe weather is any dangerous meteorological phenomenon with the potential to cause damage, serious social disruption, or loss of human life. Types of severe weather phenomena vary, depending on the latitude, altitude, topography, and atm ...

watch and warning information was also commonly disseminated by local station via a ticker, later accompanied by a map of an entire state or the station's viewing area (through a system known as

First Warning First Warning is the name of a severe weather warning system designed for broadcast television stations, typically those in the United States. A weather advisory product based on First Warning, called ''First Alert'', is an automated version of ...

). In both cases, the start of the ticker's cycle was often accompanied by an attention signal, such as warning tones, a sounder from the station's

news music Television news music is used by television stations to brand their news operations. Each television station uses an identifiable news theme; some themes are used by multiple stations while others are composed specifically for a certain station. ...

package, or a network identifier such as the

NBC chimes The NBC chimes are a sequence of three tones played on National Broadcasting Company (NBC) broadcasts. Originally developed in 1927 as seven notes, they were standardized to the current three-note version by the early 1930s, and possibly as early ...

. The first network to utilize a continuous ticker was

CNN Headline News HLN is an American basic cable network. Owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, the network primarily carries true crime programming. The channel was originally launched on January 1, 1982 by Turner Broadcasting as CNN2 (later renamed Headline News ...

. In 1989, the cable network introduced a ticker that initially featured stock market data with indexes of the major stock exchanges (including the

Dow Jones Industrial Average The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA), Dow Jones, or simply the Dow (), is a stock market index of 30 prominent companies listed on stock exchanges in the United States. The DJIA is one of the oldest and most commonly followed equity inde ...

and the

S&P 500 The Standard and Poor's 500, or simply the S&P 500, is a stock market index tracking the stock performance of 500 large companies listed on stock exchanges in the United States. It is one of the most commonly followed equity indices. As of D ...

) and quotes for major companies during market trading hours, which were updated on a 15-minute delay. This was accompanied in 1992 by the introduction of the "Headline News SportsTicker", which showed sports scores and schedules for the day's upcoming games; the combination of both tickers, with the "SportsTicker" appearing only during early morning and nighttime hours, created the first continuous news ticker on television.

CNBC CNBC (formerly Consumer News and Business Channel) is an American basic cable business news channel. It provides business news programming on weekdays from 5:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m., Eastern Time, while broadcasting talk sho ...

and forerunner network

Financial News Network The Financial News Network (FNN) was an American financial and business news television network that was launched November 30, 1981. The purpose of the network was to broadcast programming nationwide, five days a week for seven hours a day on t ...

also debuted a ticker featuring stock prices during business hours. However prior to 1996, these stock tickers could only show preselected stock quotes making the system highly manual and clumsy. The first fully automated stock ticker to appear on television was in 1996 on

CNNfn CNNfn (fn = financial news) was an American cable television news network operated by the CNN subsidiary of the media conglomerate Time Warner from December 29, 1995, and of AOL Time Warner until December 15, 2004. The network was dedicated to co ...

. By the mid-1980s,

ESPN ESPN (originally an initialism for Entertainment and Sports Programming Network) is an American international basic cable sports channel owned by ESPN Inc., owned jointly by The Walt Disney Company (80%) and Hearst Communications (20%). The ...

featured a specialized ticker at the top and bottom of each hour called the ":28/:58 update," scrolling up-to-the-minute sports scores and news. By 1996, spin-off network

ESPN2 ESPN2 is an American multinational pay television network owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and Hearst Communications (which owns the remaining 20%). ESPN2 was initially fo ...

debuted its own ticker, dubbed the "

BottomLine In business and Accountancy, accounting, net income (also total comprehensive income, net earnings, net profit, bottom line, sales profit, or credit sales) is an entity's income minus cost of goods sold, expenses, depreciation and Amortization ...

," which featured non-stop sports scores and news nearly 24 hours a day.

ESPNews ESPNews (pronounced "ESPN News", stylized ESPNEWS) is an American multinational digital cable and satellite television network owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between the Disney Media Networks division of The Walt Disney Company (which owns ...

, after a 2000 redesign of its on-air look became the first network to have its ticker remain on-screen during commercial breaks;

ESPNU ESPNU is an American multinational digital cable and satellite sports television channel owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between the Disney Media Networks division of The Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and the Hears ...

soon followed upon its launch on March 4, 2005. By September 5, 2009, all of the ESPN networks in existence at the time (ESPN, ESPN2, ESPNews, ESPNU and

ESPN Classic ESPN Classic was an American multinational pay television network owned by ESPN Inc., a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company (which owns a controlling 80% stake) and Hearst Communications (which owns 20%). The channel was originally l ...

) maintain continuous tickers that appear during programs ''and'' commercial breaks, though high-profile events such as ''

Monday Night Football ''ESPN Monday Night Football'' (abbreviated as ''MNF'' and also known as ''ESPN Monday Night Football on ABC'' for simulcasts) is an American live television broadcast of weekly National Football League (NFL) games currently airing on ESPN, AB ...

'' and the NBA Playoffs still only run the ticker at :28 and :58 past the hour, deferring to game action. While news tickers had been used occasionally by other networks over the years, the news ticker became a ubiquitous part of television news following the

in 2001. Needing a way to provide a continuous stream of vital but repetitive emergency information to viewers,

placed a ticker on-screen at 10:49am

Eastern Time The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico, Panama, Colombia, mainland Ecuador, Peru, and a small port ...

CNN CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by the M ...

implemented its own ticker at 11:11am, with

MSNBC MSNBC (originally the Microsoft National Broadcasting Company) is an American news-based pay television cable channel. It is owned by NBCUniversala subsidiary of Comcast. Headquartered in New York City, it provides news coverage and political ...

adding one of their own at approximately 2:00pm. Although the need for tickers to relay information related to the aftermath of the

terrorist attack Terrorism, in its broadest sense, is the use of criminal violence to provoke a state of terror or fear, mostly with the intention to achieve political or religious aims. The term is used in this regard primarily to refer to intentional violen ...

s lasted only a few weeks, management at all three

cable news Cable news channels are television networks devoted to television news broadcasts, with the name deriving from the proliferation of such networks during the 1980s with the advent of cable television. In the United States, the first nationwide ca ...

channels quickly decided that the use of tickers would help increase viewership by allowing the ability to process multiple simultaneous streams of information. As a result, the tickers have been permanent features on all three channels ever since, except during some documentary programming, presidential speeches, or other selected programs.

CNN Headline News/HLN

The "HLN SportsTicker" was test-launched on the GCTV cable system in 1992, and then expanded nationally in December 1993; with the combination of an existing stock ticker that ran continuously while U.S. markets were in trading, this created the first continuous 24-hour ticker on television. The "HLN SportsTicker" provided scores for professional sports and a deep roster of college sports events as well as scheduling information for games that were to be played later in the day; it also experimented with incorporating in-game sports news such as pitching changes, time remaining, injury reports and statistics. The idea for the "HLN SportsTicker" first met with resistance by some CNN news anchors and executives. Before the popularization of the Internet, the "HLN SportsTicker" was the first available method of getting this information in real time to viewers that would normally be disseminated only during local news programs, morning newspapers or ESPN's ''

SportsCenter ''SportsCenter'' (SC) is a daily sports news television show, television program that serves as the flagship program and brand of United States, American cable television, cable and satellite television television network, network ESPN. The show ...

''. At the time, many newspapers and even ESPN were not covering college scores outside of the top 25 teams ranked on the

, among the approximately 110

and over 200

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

teams. The HLN SportsTicker's presentation was organized by conference and covered every team in Division I including women's basketball, men's baseball and hockey. To accommodate the sports and stock tickers, the video feed containing Headline News' rolling newscasts was shrunk to a

pillarbox The pillarbox effect occurs in widescreen video displays when black bars (mattes or masking) are placed on the sides of the image. It becomes necessary when film or video that was not originally designed for widescreen is shown on a widescreen ...

ed placement above the ticker, with blue bars on the left and right wings of the screen (matching the ticker's original coloring). The ticker's design was revised in 1994, with a

translucent In the field of optics, transparency (also called pellucidity or diaphaneity) is the physical property of allowing light to pass through the material without appreciable scattering of light. On a macroscopic scale (one in which the dimensions a ...

black background overlaid on the lower third of the video feed – which was now presented full-screen. Another innovation of the HLN SportsTicker was the fully automated combination of computer-generated graphics with a wire news service. Jim Alexander, Director of CNN Research who proposed (on October 13, 1989) and developed the HLN SportsTicker, worked with Ken Mullins who created the computer programming to recognize the conventions and labels in the wire service data and convert them into the words and symbols displayed along the screen. The speed of the scroll and font type became important as to not distract the viewers from content on the rest of the screen, but readable for viewers that started watching the network for the ticker itself. The increased viewership (for example, Headline News saw 60% increase in male viewers aged 25–54 in the Saturday 3:00–10:00pm ET period during the fourth quarter of 1994) demonstrated a market for this type of data and the ability of people to visually navigate a screen with more than one set of content. Over time, Headline News began providing more information through tickers, including news headlines and weather information, expanding in 2001 to include a large L-shaped "window" format that was heavily criticized; now known as HLN, the channel eventually limited use of a ticker to news headlines, and eventually discontinued it altogether by 2011 (with the exception of those used on certain programs such as ''

Showbiz Tonight ''Showbiz Tonight'' is a defunct American entertainment news program that aired from February 20, 2005, until February 6, 2014, on HLN. ''Showbiz Tonight'' was hosted by A. J. Hammer at CNN New York at the time of its cancellation. The show re ...

'' to display viewer comments to stories featured on the program).

Fox News Channel

Fox News Channel was the first American cable news network to debut a permanent news ticker, at 10:49am ET, on September 11, 2001, to relay information on the

terrorist attacks The following is a list of terrorist incidents that have not been carried out by a state or its forces (see state terrorism and state-sponsored terrorism). Assassinations are listed at List of assassinated people. Definitions of terrori ...

that began two hours earlier with the separate crashes of two hijacked airplanes into the

World Trade Center World Trade Centers are sites recognized by the World Trade Centers Association. World Trade Center may refer to: Buildings * List of World Trade Centers * World Trade Center (2001–present), a building complex that includes five skyscrapers, a ...

. The scrolling ticker displayed headlines in yellow lettering on a black band, with a general "FOX" logo as a

bullet A bullet is a kinetic projectile, a component of firearm ammunition that is shot from a gun barrel. Bullets are made of a variety of materials, such as copper, lead, steel, polymer, rubber and even wax. Bullets are made in various shapes and co ...

to separate each story. From 2001 to 2004, the ticker featured a Helvetica Narrow font, after which it was replaced by a normal Helvetica font that was used until 2013, when the font switched to Avenir. The text was colored blue for a short time in 2007, before reverting to yellow on September 24 of that year, starting with that day's edition of the ''

Fox Report The ''Fox Report'' is an American evening television news program on Fox News, which debuted on September 13, 1999 as a seven-night-a-week broadcast with Shepard Smith as main anchor of the program until it was relegated to weekends only after the ...

''. The ticker's background was also made translucent in late 2007, before reverting to a black band in 2008, at which time a "Fox News" text logo replaced the "Fox" logo as the headline bullet (this, in turn, was replaced with an abbreviated "FNC" text bullet in 2013; the text color itself was changed to white two years later). As of October 7, 2013, only ''

Shepard Smith Reporting ''Bill Hemmer Reports'' was an American television news/opinion/ talk program on Fox News Channel hosted by Bill Hemmer. Episodes aired at 3 p.m. ET on Monday through Friday. The show focused on the day's events with interviews, current event up ...

'' (which debuted that day) used the Fox News ticker featuring white Avenir text with a red band, as opposed to a black band on other programming. In September 2017, as part of a major graphics redesign, the Fox News ticker was shortened on both ends of the 16:9 display, with the "Fox News" text logo returning to the ticker. The on-screen ticker was removed on Monday, April 26, 2021, six days after the death of Mike Santangelo, the writer for the ticker and the News Corp. Building zipper directly above the FNC studios. No return date has been mentioned.

CNN

CNN launched its own ticker to relay updates on the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, at 11:11am ET, less than a half-hour after Fox News implemented its own for this purpose. The ticker became a staple on the network for the next seven years. It was given only a few, minor changes during its run, but always featured yellow lettering on a black background, with the CNN logo as a bullet for each scrolled story (sister channel Headline News used a nearly identical ticker except featuring a blue background). CNN/U.S. and Headline News converted their respective tickers to a "flipper" version on December 15, 2008, with the introduction of new on-screen graphics package; a "flipper" ticker had already been in use previously on sister network

CNN International CNN International (CNNI, simply branded on-air as CNN) is an international television channel that is owned by CNN Global. CNN International carries news-related programming worldwide; it cooperates with sister network CNN's national and inter ...

. In 2012, after a trial run during its ''

American Morning ''American Morning'' was an American three-hour morning television news program that aired on CNN from 2001 to 2011. ''American Morning'' debuted with anchors Paula Zahn and Anderson Cooper on the day after the September 11 attacks, five months e ...

'' program, the ticker was modified to feature stories grouped into individual categories (such as national headlines, world news and entertainment stories) in a similar manner to ESPN's BottomLine (a parsing error resulted in the animation that was intended to display each news category to be displayed as a simple static arrow followed by the name of the current and forthcoming category on other programs for several months). The traditional scrolling ticker was brought back on February 18, 2013 at 11:56 am ET, specifically at the insistence of new network president

Jeff Zucker Jeffrey Adam Zucker (born April 9, 1965) is an American former media executive. Between January 2013 and February 2022, Zucker was the president of CNN Worldwide. Zucker oversaw CNN, CNN International, HLN, and CNN Digital. He was previously C ...

, which originally displayed with white text on a dark blue background, before switching the next day, from 5:00 am ET, to blue text on a shadowed white and grey background. During breaking news coverage, the entire ticker is displayed with a dark red background (though sometimes the regular colors remain), while the ticker uses a blue background for network promotions. On August 11, 2014 (as part of an update to the network's graphics package), the ticker was changed to a white text on a black background, with the red-colored CNN.com box served as a bullet for each scrolled story and triangle-shaped arrows used to separate topical details. For breaking news, white text would be displayed on a red background, with the bullet being a gray-colored @CNNBRK box. As of 2013, the ticker is only deactivated entirely during special event coverage, documentaries and overnight repeats. Before that, the ticker was deactivated between 7:00 pm ET and the next day's first live broadcast. During federal election coverage, the ticker is replaced by a larger pane showing more detailed information (such as responses to live polling during debates and speeches, and results from various states, counties and congressional districts). Holiday travel weekends feature the bottom-third filled with a graphic of major cities, their temperatures and current flight delays, while severe snowstorm and hurricane coverage has the same information, along with current average wind speed and a tracking map of a storm's path.

MSNBC

MSNBC was the last cable news network to debut a ticker on September 11, 2001, at 2:00pm ET. Like Fox News and CNN, MSNBC's ticker was displayed with yellow lettering, but utilized a slightly transparent background. When the network's on-screen graphics were revamped in 2006, the ticker was also changed to featuring white lettering over a dark gray background. When MSNBC launched its high-definition feed on June 29, 2009, its ticker took on a flipper style similar to that used by CNN. The design also repositioned other graphic elements such as the network and program logos, current time, stock exchange data and "live" indicator as a banner graphic at the top of the screen, a first for a non-sports- or non-business-oriented specialty news channel in the United States. The MSNBC ticker could be seen during the network's morning and daytime broadcasts, but was removed during live primetime broadcasts of the network's political talk shows (''

The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell ''The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell'' is an American weeknight news and political commentary program on MSNBC. The program airs live at 10:00 P.M. Eastern Time Monday-Friday, and is hosted by Lawrence O'Donnell from Mondays to Thursdays and re ...

'', ''

Hardball Hardball, in English, more specifically American English, generally refers to baseball (as opposed to its variant softball), especially when played very competitively. Metaphorically, it refers to uncompromising and ruthless methods or dealings, ...

'' and ''

The Rachel Maddow Show ''The Rachel Maddow Show'' (also abbreviated ''TRMS'') is an American liberal news and opinion television program that airs on MSNBC, running in the 9:00 pm ET timeslot Monday evenings. It is hosted by Rachel Maddow, who gained a public pr ...

''), broadcasts of ''

MSNBC Documentaries ''MSNBC Documentaries'' is the umbrella title of a series of documentaries co-produced by NBC News and MSNBC. Broadcast on MSNBC, each documentary is given its own title to broadcast under (e.g., ''Lockup: Return to Pelican Bay'') or has been p ...

'', and during daytime shows (''

The Daily Rundown ''The'' () is a grammatical article in English, denoting persons or things already mentioned, under discussion, implied or otherwise presumed familiar to listeners, readers, or speakers. It is the definite article in English. ''The'' is the m ...

'' and ''

The Dylan Ratigan Show ''The Dylan Ratigan Show'' is an American television program on MSNBC hosted by Dylan Ratigan, formerly of sister CNBC's '' Fast Money''. It aired weekdays from 4pm to 5pm Eastern Time. The show was previously known as ''Morning Meeting with Dylan ...

'') that instead utilized a "rundown banner" for each segment. On August 15, 2015, MSNBC refreshed their on-air look again. The ticker has returned to the scrolling format and continues to appear on screen through primetime. During election coverage, the upper bar and lower ticker (displaying a live vote percentage tally) are both colored deep blue and are shown continuously during both programming and commercials. However, on April 16, 2018, MSNBC completely removed the news ticker at the bottom of the screen on every program, citing the reason "for a cleaner view that puts our reporting more front and center ... and we want viewers to get the best possible experience".

CNBC

Since its inception in 1989, CNBC (owned by

Comcast Comcast Corporation (formerly known as American Cable Systems and Comcast Holdings),Before the AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corpora ...

, parent company of both

and MSNBC) has used a special ticker to monitor the values of

securities A security is a tradable financial asset. The term commonly refers to any form of financial instrument, but its legal definition varies by jurisdiction. In some countries and languages people commonly use the term "security" to refer to any for ...

and

indexes Index (or its plural form indices) may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional entities * Index (''A Certain Magical Index''), a character in the light novel series ''A Certain Magical Index'' * The Index, an item on a Halo megastru ...

on the

. The business news network uses a two-paned ticker placed at the lower-third of the screen, which run at slightly different speeds: the white top banner monitors market and commodity summaries, while the dark-blue bottom banner monitors stock quotes for individual companies and (particularly during early morning hours, when only data from international markets are available) provides news headlines,

weather forecasts Weather forecasting is the application of science and technology to predict the conditions of the atmosphere for a given location and time. People have attempted to predict the weather informally for millennia and formally since the 19th centu ...

(discontinued since 2015) and sports scores from the previous day. A rotating ticker, partitioned into three segments, is also used that displays index and security prices (originally displayed as a vertical box, before converting into a banner graphic across the top of the screen on December 19, 2005; however, it reverted to a vertical box on October 13, 2014 as part of an update to the network's graphics package in conjunction with a network-wide switch to a 16:9

widescreen Widescreen images are displayed within a set of aspect ratios (relationship of image width to height) used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than t ...

format that day). These tickers are not displayed during CNBC's primetime or paid programming (between 7:00pm and 4:00am ET and on weekends). At the time of its implementation, computers could not keep up with the full stock feed and as such, the ticker could only show pre-selected stocks making the system highly manual and clumsy.

CNNfn

, a now-defunct business news network spun-off from CNN, was the first to create a fully automated stock ticker for television. Until the network launched in 1996, computers were not able to maintain the entire stock feed in memory to enable delaying all quotes and commodity summaries in 15-minute intervals. Tickers previously implemented for the purpose of disseminating stock data were preselected subsets of the feed and could not automatically select stocks of interest without manual intervention. Working with

SGI SGI may refer to: Companies *Saskatchewan Government Insurance *Scientific Games International, a gambling company *Silicon Graphics, Inc., a former manufacturer of high-performance computing products *Silicon Graphics International, formerly Rac ...

and

Standard & Poor's S&P Global Ratings (previously Standard & Poor's and informally known as S&P) is an American credit rating agency (CRA) and a division of S&P Global that publishes financial research and analysis on stocks, bonds, and commodities. S&P is con ...

data feed, Nils B. Lahr, a developer at CNNfn, developed the first system that could provide delayed stock market quotes in a dynamic television display as a ticker. This was a major advancement, as the viewers, for the first time, understood that the ticker represented all available stocks and thus would reflect any vital changes without manual intervention or pre-selected stock quotes.

Sports channels

Almost all cable sports channels, and occasionally broadcast television telecasts of sporting events, utilize tickers that display sports news headlines, as well as ongoing and final scores from other events (including, from time to time, up-to-the-minute updates and statistics from events in progress),

fantasy sports A fantasy sport (also known less commonly as rotisserie or roto) is a game, often played using the Internet, where participants assemble imaginary or virtual teams composed of proxies of real players of a professional sport. These teams compete bas ...

scoring and ranking, promotions for upcoming programs, and with the legalization of

sports betting Sports betting is the activity of predicting sports results and placing a wager on the outcome. The frequency of sports bet upon varies by culture, with the vast majority of bets being placed on association football, American football, basket ...

in the United States, the over-under line and other gambling statistics. The practice was introduced by

in 1995 when it introduced a ticker known as the "BottomLine". The use of tickers during sporting events varies: most channels leave their tickers up during all programming and events, or more often when covering sports (such as

) where a large number of games are being played at the same time. Some channels may disable their tickers during live events and original programming to reduce distraction, especially during high-profile events (such as flagship broadcast windows or playoff/championship events). If a broadcaster does disable their ticker during an event, it may be shown temporarily at intervals, and during studio segments aired during intermissions (such as

halftime In several team sports, matches are played in two halves. Half-time (also written halftime or half time) is the name given to the interval between the two halves of the match. Typically, after half-time, teams swap ends of the field of play in or ...

). With the legalization of

in several states, betting lines and over/under information has been added to the stream of information. Upon its launch in 2021,

Bally Sports The Bally Sports Regional Networks are a group of regional sports networks in the United States owned by Diamond Sports Group, a joint-venture company of the Sinclair Broadcast Group and Entertainment Studios. The naming rights to the network we ...

took on a more distinctive application of a ticker, in which the scorebug is displayed in the bottom-left corner of the screen, and statistics and information related to the game is occasionally displayed in a strip to the right of the scorebug. When not displaying contextual information, the ticker otherwise displays sports scores, sports betting lines befitting their Bally's branding, and headlines.

Other tickers

* The national

morning show Breakfast television (Europe, Canada, and Australia) or morning show (United States) is a type of news or infotainment television programme that broadcasts live in the morning (typically scheduled between 5:00 and 10:00a.m., or if it is a lo ...

s of the

Big Three networks In the United States, there are three major traditional commercial broadcast television networks — CBS (Columbia Broadcasting System), NBC (National Broadcasting Company), and ABC (American Broadcasting Company) — that due to their longev ...

, ''

CBS Mornings ''CBS Mornings'' is an American morning television program which is broadcast on CBS. The program debuted on September 7, 2021, and airs live every weekday from 7:00a.m. to 9:00a.m. It is hosted by Gayle King, Tony Dokoupil, and Nate Burleson, ...

'', ''

Good Morning America ''Good Morning America'' (often abbreviated as ''GMA'') is an American morning television program that is broadcast on ABC. It debuted on November 3, 1975, and first expanded to weekends with the debut of a Sunday edition on January 3, 1993. Th ...

'', and ''

'', reserve an area in their on-screen graphics for stations to display a ticker containing local news headlines. If a ticker is not used, the area typically remains blank, although ''Good Morning America'' does provide a fallback headline scroll featuring national and international news stories if a station does not overlay it with its own. *

The Weather Channel The Weather Channel (TWC) is an American pay television channel owned by Weather Group, LLC, a subsidiary of Allen Media Group. The channel's headquarters are in Atlanta, Georgia. Launched on May 2, 1982, the channel broadcasts weather forecas ...

, a weather-centric cable news channel uses a ticker – known as the "Lower Display Line" – which (as of 2013) displays local current weather observations (temperature, sky condition and wind), daypart and extended forecasts, and the current time by time zone in a usually perpetual format. This ticker is accompanied by a vertical sidebar on the right side of the screen (introduced as part of the network's "Weather All The Time" campaign, and visible only on TWC's high definition feed), which provides a rundown of upcoming segments and supplementary weather data, and unlike the main lower-third ticker, is removed during commercial breaks; a separate black ticker with white text and red accents appearing above the local LDL (compared to the white-on-blue version normally used, and introduced in this current form in 2012) is used to relay ongoing severe weather alerts for the local area issued by the

National Weather Service The National Weather Service (NWS) is an Government agency, agency of the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government that is tasked with providing weather forecasts, warnings of hazardous weather, and other weathe ...

and/or

Storm Prediction Center The Storm Prediction Center (SPC) is a US government agency A government or state agency, sometimes an appointed commission, is a permanent or semi-permanent organization in the machinery of government that is responsible for the oversight a ...

. Both the ticker and sidebar are inserted over the national feed by a proprietary computer system inserted at the headend of cable television providers; however a fallback ticker/sidebar displaying observations, forecasts and airport delays for major U.S. cities, as well as record data and specialty forecasts is displayed on The Weather Channel's national feed available to satellite and some telco providers that are unable or chose not to utilize these systems. * Local television stations (mainly major network affiliates) similarly may air weather alerts from the National Weather Service and Storm Prediction Center by way of a ticker, accompanied by a beeping alert tone, a cut from the station's

package, or a network ID sounder (such as the

on NBC-affiliated stations) as an audio leader to warn viewers of its issuance, and in many cases, a map of the viewing area or state showing the alerts in a color-coded display. Some stations (particularly those without a news department) incorporate an audio feed from a local

NOAA Weather Radio NOAA Weather Radio NWR; also known as NOAA Weather Radio All Hazards is an automated 24-hour network of VHF FM weather radio stations in the United States (U.S.) that broadcast weather information directly from a nearby National Weather Serv ...

station to provide detailed alert information, whereas the ticker in these instances will simply display details on the issued alert type, its time of expiration and the jurisdictions affected. The ticker may appear at the lower-third or upper-third of the screen, depending on the station's preference. Since the early 2000s, television stations have also used tickers to provide information on ongoing breaking news stories continuously during regular programming and commercials, and to provide local and national news headlines and weather forecasts – and in some cases, traffic data and

lottery A lottery is a form of gambling that involves the drawing of numbers at random for a prize. Some governments outlaw lotteries, while others endorse it to the extent of organizing a national or state lottery. It is common to find some degree of ...

results – during local (usually morning) newscasts. Stations may also use tickers to inform viewers of programming notices (including pre-emptions and scheduling changes due to other factors), as part of required weekly or monthly tests of an emergency notification system, or to inform viewers of station contests or station-sponsored charity events. ** Since May 26, 2015, under the

Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010 The Twenty-First Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act of 2010 (CVAA) is a United States accessibility law. Signed on October 8, 2010, by then-president Barack Obama, the bill amended the Communications Act of 1934 to include updated ...

, television stations that run tickers conveying "emergency information" (outside of

Emergency Alert System The Emergency Alert System (EAS) is a national warning system in the United States designed to allow authorized officials to broadcast emergency alerts and warning messages to the public via cable, satellite, or broadcast television, and both ...

and newscasts) most provide a

text-to-speech Speech synthesis is the artificial production of human speech. A computer system used for this purpose is called a speech synthesizer, and can be implemented in software or hardware products. A text-to-speech (TTS) system converts normal languag ...

narration of the text of the ticker on

second audio program Second audio program (SAP), also known as secondary audio programming, is an auxiliary audio channel for analog television that can be broadcast or transmitted both over-the-air and by cable television. Used mostly for audio description or oth ...

. * For music and

music video A music video is a video of variable duration, that integrates a music song or a music album with imagery that is produced for promotion (marketing), promotional or musical artistic purposes. Modern music videos are primarily made and used as a m ...

channels, the usage of a ticker has varied. ''

IMX Immature (later known as IMx) is an American Contemporary R&B, R&B boy band, managed by record producer Chris Stokes (record producer), Chris Stokes. Its members include Marques Houston, Marques "Batman" Houston (born August 4, 1981), Young Rome, ...

'' (later ''Daily Download''), which ran from 2003 to 2006 on

Fuse Fuse or FUSE may refer to: Devices * Fuse (electrical), a device used in electrical systems to protect against excessive current ** Fuse (automotive), a class of fuses for vehicles * Fuse (hydraulic), a device used in hydraulic systems to protect ...

, used a ticker to display the current scores (or "stock value") of bands, albums, music videos and television offerings according to the online game played by users of ''IMX''s website; the values of the properties were influenced by current

Billboard A billboard (also called a hoarding in the UK and many other parts of the world) is a large outdoor advertising structure (a billing board), typically found in high-traffic areas such as alongside busy roads. Billboards present large advertise ...

charts and concert sales, among other criteria.

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

, since 2008, features a "flipper" ticker to provide information on musical works and artists featured within its programming. Current tickers during music video programming mainly feature

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social medi ...

content such as fan requests and "shout outs" from sources such as

and

, along with music news headlines usually sourced to the network's website. *

C-SPAN Cable-Satellite Public Affairs Network (C-SPAN ) is an American cable and satellite television network that was created in 1979 by the cable television industry as a nonprofit public service. It televises many proceedings of the United States ...

's television channels display news tickers, which announce political and legal news items and upcoming live broadcasts.

Canada

Like the United States, tickers are typically used by 24-hour news channels such as

CBC News Network CBC News Network (formerly CBC Newsworld) is a Canadian English-language specialty news channel owned by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC). It broadcasts into over 10 million homes in Canada. As Canada's first all-news channel, it is th ...

and CTV News Channel (the latter using CNN's now-former "flipper" format and also shown during commercial breaks), as well as during local morning news programs. Tickers are also sometimes used to display an

Alert Ready The National Public Alerting System (NPAS; french: Système national d'alertes à la population), branded as Alert Ready (), is the national warning system in Canada, broadcast to Canadian television, radio, and wireless devices. The system con ...

on the center of the screen in case of an emergency/test.

South America

Brazil

In Brazil, news tickers were introduced in the early 2000s and are often used by all Pay television, pay news channels, such as GloboNews, BandNews TV and Record News (the latter is free-to-air as well). In 2015, two pay sports channels, ESPN (Brazil), ESPN and Fox Sports, introduced their news tickers in some programs and games. Sometimes they are also used in a few free-to-air channels, usually to show

messages sent by the viewers.

In popular culture

The use of news tickers has also been parodied on a number of films and television programs, including a 2003 episode of ''The Simpsons'' ("Mr. Spritz Goes to Washington"), as well as a sketch featured on ''Saturday Night Live''. Some programs and films such as ''Austin Powers in Goldmember'' sometimes place jokes within their parody news crawls. The Onion, The Onion News Network uses a parody ticker to offer jokes in its online newscasts. The Australian comedy news series ''CNNNN'' went a step further: although it featured a joke news ticker throughout the show, one episode featured a news ticker that summarized the initial news ticker, as well as one for the sight impaired, which covered the whole screen. The music video for the Chamillionaire rap single "Hip Hop Police" incorporated a parodical news ticker announcing the arrests of famous musicians.

References

External links

DMOZ news tickers
{{DEFAULTSORT:News Ticker Digital media Television news Television terminology Film and video technology

Current uses

Television

On personal computers

News tickers on buildings

By country

Asia

China

India

Indonesia

Malaysia

Pakistan

Philippines

South Korea

Singapore

Thailand

Vietnam

Australia

Europe

United Kingdom

North America

United States

CNN Headline News/HLN

Fox News Channel

CNN

MSNBC

CNBC

CNNfn

Sports channels

Other tickers

Canada

South America

Brazil

In popular culture

See also

References

External links