Las Estrellas ("The Stars"; previously El Canal de las Estrellas, or "The Channel of the Stars") is one of the cornerstone networks of TelevisaUnivision, with affiliate stations all over Mexico, flagshipped at

XEW-TDT XEW-TDT (channel 2) is a television station in Mexico City, Mexico. The station is owned by Grupo Televisa and is the flagship station to the Las Estrellas network. XEW is the second-oldest Televisa station and Mexico City's second-oldest stati ...

in Mexico City. Many of the programs of ''Las Estrellas'' are seen in the United States on

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, and

Galavisión Galavisión is an American Spanish-language pay television network owned by TelevisaUnivision. The network is unrelated to the earlier Mexican channel of the same name, though both broadcast Televisa-produced programming. As of February 2015, a ...

History

Las Estrellas originated from XEW-TV, which began broadcasting on 21 March 1951. The channel was a sister station to the legendary XEW-AM radio station, owned by Emilio Azcárraga Vidaurreta, which was also the owner of the newly launched channel. It was the second commercial TV channel to be established in Mexico City, after

XHTV XHTV-TDT (virtual channel 4), founded in 1950 by Romulo O'Farril, is a flagship TV station of Televisa and carries its Foro (TV channel), FORO news network. FOROtv is available on various cable television companies and SKY México satellite serv ...

channel 4, owned by the Novedades newspaper. XEW-TV's first transmission was a live, play-by-play, outside broadcast of a Mexican League match, with XEW radio veteran

Pedro Septién Pedro Septién Orozco (March 21, 1916 – December 19, 2013) was a Mexican sports broadcaster. He was nicknamed ''El Mago'' (Spanish for "The Wizard"). Septien was famous in Mexico due to his vast knowledge about Major League Baseball. He worked ...

on commentary duties. Other than live sports broadcasts, XEW-TV initially broadcast films from the

Golden Age of Mexican cinema The Golden Age of Mexican cinema ( es, Época de Oro del Cine Mexicano) is a period in the history of the Cinema of Mexico between 1930 and 1969 when the Mexican film industry reached high levels of production, quality and economic success of its ...

, as its studios in Chapultepec 18 were still under construction. The studio complex, known as Televicentro, would be inaugurated in January 1952. Soon thereafter, the programming scope would be expanded to include live variety shows and television theatre showcases, in a style similar to XEW radio's similarly formatted shows. XEW-TV would be a pioneer in Mexican television, and would establish many industry firsts. In 1962, the channel would become the flagship network of the newly merged Telesistema Mexicano, which also brought XHTV and XHGC under Azcárraga's hands, and, after merging with XHTM-TV and Televisión Independiente de México, many of these station's programs would move to XEW-TV. As a result, XEW-TV rapidly grew and became the country's most watched TV network, a position which was undisputed for many years, as Televisa held a monopoly on commercial TV in Mexico, which even went into heavily influencing the political landscape in the country. As a result, by 1985, and in preparation for the

1986 FIFA World Cup The 1986 FIFA World Cup was the 13th FIFA World Cup, a quadrennial football tournament for men's senior national teams. It was played in Mexico from 31 May to 29 June 1986. The tournament was the second to feature a 24-team format. Colombia ha ...

(in which Televisa was the host broadcaster), XEW-TV was renamed El Canal de las Estrellas, in reference to the station's line-up of actors, comedians and presenters. This was further reinforced with the launch of an image campaign song, sung by Lucía Méndez, in 1988. After the death of Emilio Azcárraga Milmo in 1997, El Canal de las Estrellas suffered a massive restructuring of its programming. The biggest moment of the restructuring came in 1998, when 24 Horas, the Jacobo Zabludovsky-anchored newscast, long a propaganda mouthpiece of the Mexican political regime, was canceled. The station's brand identity was also replaced with a new logo created by Pablo Rovalo. After a period of ratings turmoil, viewership stabilized, but the channel had to contend now with a surgent XHDF, freshly privatized and bought under the auspicies of

TV Azteca TV Azteca, S.A.B. de C.V. is a Mexican multimedia conglomerate owned by Grupo Salinas. It is the second-largest mass media company in Mexico after Televisa. It primarily competes with Televisa as well as some local operators. It owns two national ...

. After years of decline, particularly after

2012 File:2012 Events Collage V3.png, From left, clockwise: The passenger cruise ship Costa Concordia lies capsized after the Costa Concordia disaster; Damage to Casino Pier in Seaside Heights, New Jersey as a result of Hurricane Sandy; People gather ...

, as accusations of political bias in favor of then-President

Enrique Peña Nieto Enrique Peña Nieto (; born 20 July 1966), commonly referred to by his initials EPN, is a Mexican politician who served as the 64th president of Mexico from 1 December 2012 to 30 November 2018. A member of the Institutional Revolutionary Party ...

began to hamper the broadcaster's credibility, in 2016, the decision was made to relaunch entirely the station's branding and programming. On 22 August 2016, XEW-TV was renamed as Las Estrellas, and introduced many changes to its programming schedule, including shorter and snappier telenovelas and news programming, as well as dropping many long-running programming in favour of programming oriented to a younger audience. The changes generated a big ratings decline; as a result, by 2017, much of the new programming was canceled and the prime time telenovelas and news programming were relocated to pre-relaunch timeslots and viewership stabilized, specially, during the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

Las Estrellas Internacional

Las Estrellas is available as a pay television network in Europe and Australia as Las Estrellas Europa and Las Estrellas Latinoamérica in Central and South America through Televisa Networks.Canal de las Estrellas Latinoamerica: Latin America coverage
Both feeds differ from the Las Estrellas programming, usually broadcasting shows weeks behind their original broadcast. In Canada, XEW-TDT and the Las Estrellas schedule is available in full on

Rogers Cable Rogers Cable Inc. is Canada's largest cable television service provider with about 2.25 million television customers, and over 930,000 Internet subscribers, primarily in Southern & Eastern Ontario, New Brunswick and Newfoundland and Labrador. Ro ...

(limited to the

Greater Toronto Area The Greater Toronto Area, commonly referred to as the GTA, includes the City of Toronto and the regional municipalities of Durham, Halton, Peel, and York. In total, the region contains 25 urban, suburban, and rural municipalities. The Greater T ...

) and

Bell Fibe TV Bell Fibe TV is an IP-based television service offered by Bell Canada in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec. It is bundled with a FTTN or FTTH Bell Internet service, and uses the Mediaroom platform. Bell Fibe TV officially launched on Septem ...

as an eligible foreign service.

Network logos

File:XEW TV Canal 2 1950 logo.PNG, 1951 logo File:Canal 2 1970s logo.PNG, 1968 logo File:El Canal de las Estrellas 1980s logo.PNG, 1988 logo El Canal de las Estrellas 1993.png , 1993 logo File:Canal de las Estrellas 1997-2007.svg, 1997 logo File:Canal de las Estrellas logo.svg, 2007 logo File:XEW-TV2014.png, 2014 logo File:Las Estrellas.svg, 2016 logo

Programming

Weekday programming in the afternoon and prime time consists of

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. Las Estrellas airs sports programming and sports specials like the Olympic Games and the FIFA World Cup. Morning and afternoon programming consists of news, sports, talk shows, and variety shows. Night time programming is filled with a news program and

-produced shows. Examples of shows produced by Las Estrellas are ''Recuerda y Gana'', ''Hoy'', ''El Juego de las Estrellas'', and ''Cuéntamelo ya''. The network also produces and airs the '' Premios TVyNovelas'', sponsored by the Televisa-owned magazine of the same name and considered the highest honor in the domestic Mexican television industry.

Repeaters

The following is a list of all full-time Las Estrellas repeaters: , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , - , -

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Estrellas, Las Television channels and stations established in 1951 Television networks in Mexico Televisa broadcast television networks Mass media in Mexico City Spanish-language television stations in Mexico 1951 establishments in Mexico