1988–89 United States network television schedule

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List of American television programs currently in production

Morning: 1986–87
1987–88
1988–89
1989–90
1990–91

Overnight: 1986–87
1987–88
1988–89
1989–90
1990–91

The 1988–89 network television schedule for the four major English language commercial broadcast networks in the United States covers primetime hours from September 1988 through August 1989. The schedule is followed by a list per network of returning series, new series, and series cancelled after the 1987–88 season.

PBS is not included; member stations have local flexibility over most of their schedules and broadcast times for network shows may vary.

New series are highlighted in bold.

All times are U.S. Eastern Time and Pacific Time (except for some live sports or events). Subtract one hour for Central, Mountain, Alaska and Hawaii–Aleutian times.

Each of the 30 highest-rated shows is listed with its rank and rating as determined by Nielsen Media Research.

Writers' strike impact

Main article: 1988 Writers Guild of America strike

The 1988 Writers Guild of America strike lasted between March 7 and August 7. During the strike, production on scripted television series across all of the major television networks was suspended. The writers' strike forced the networks to postpone the start of the fall 1988 schedule later than usual; rather than the traditional late-September/early-October start, new and returning series had their premieres delayed until late October and into November. In the interim, the networks had to rely on a hodgepodge of programming, including reruns, films, entertainment and news specials, program-length political advertising, and unscripted original series (e.g. CBS' High Risk); NBC and ABC also benefited from sports programming (NBC relied on the Summer Olympics in September and the World Series in October, while ABC had postseason baseball coverage and moved up the start time for the early weeks of Monday Night Football from 9 p.m. ET to 8 p.m. ET to replace MacGyver, which was not yet ready with new episodes at the time). Even though previous strikes of Hollywood employees occurred in 1980 and 1981, those strikes only had a minor effect on the production of television programs that aired in the 1980–81 and 1981–82 seasons. The 1988–89 television season was thus the first of four television seasons to have its start delayed due to issues outside of the control of the major networks; further instances occurred in the 2001–02 season (due to the networks' news coverage of the September 11 attacks), the 2020–21 season (due to the suspension of television productions as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic), and the 2023–24 season (due to the 2023 Hollywood labor disputes).

Legend

Light blue indicates local programming.
Gray indicates encore programming.
Blue-gray indicates news programming.
Light green indicates sporting events.
Red indicates series being burned off and other irregularly scheduled programs, including specials and movies.
highlight Yellow highlights indicates the top-10 most watched programs of the season.
highlight Cyan highlights indicates numbers 11-20 most watched programs of the season.
highlight Magenta highlights indicates numbers 21-30 most watched programs of the season.
highlight Highlights indicates that it falls in multiple of the above categories.

Sunday

Network		7:00 p.m.	8:00 p.m.	8:30 p.m.	9:00 p.m.	9:30 p.m.	10:00 p.m.	10:30 p.m.
ABC	Fall	Incredible Sunday	Mission: Impossible		The ABC Sunday Night Movie
	Winter	Great Circuses of the World	Special programming
	Spring	Incredible Sunday	Moonlighting
	Summer		Have Faith (R)	The ABC Sunday Night Movie
	Late summer		MacGyver (R)		The ABC Sunday Night Movie
CBS		60 Minutes (5/21.7)	Murder, She Wrote (8/19.9)		CBS Sunday Movie (27/16.1) (Tied with Knots Landing)
Fox	Fall	21 Jump Street	America's Most Wanted	Married... with Children	It's Garry Shandling's Show	The Tracey Ullman Show	Duet	Local programming
Fox	Summer	21 Jump Street	America's Most Wanted	Totally Hidden Video	Married... with Children (R)	It's Garry Shandling's Show	The Tracey Ullman Show (R)	Duet (R)
NBC		The Magical World of Disney	Family Ties	Day by Day	NBC Sunday Night Movie (22/16.3) (Tied with The Hogan Family and The Wonder Years)

Notes:

Quantum Leap had a two-hour premiere Sunday, March 26, 1989, on NBC.
The Jim Henson Hour briefly replaced The Magical World of Disney on May 14, 1989, and again between July 9-July 30.
On ABC, A Fine Romance was supposed to air 8-9 p.m., but production delays amidst the strike forced the move to Thursdays.

Monday

Network		8:00 p.m.	8:30 p.m.	9:00 p.m.	9:30 p.m.	10:00 p.m.	10:30 p.m.
ABC	Fall	Monday Night Football (15/17.5) (Tied with ALF)
	November	MacGyver		Monday Night Football (15/17.5) (Tied with ALF)
	Winter			The ABC Monday Night Movie
	Mid-winter			The ABC Monday Mystery Movie* (29/15.4) (Tied with Dallas)
CBS	Fall	Newhart	The Cavanaughs	CBS Monday Night Movie
	Mid-fall		Coming of Age	CBS Monday Night Movie
	Winter		Kate & Allie	Murphy Brown	Designing Women	Almost Grown
	Spring	Live-In	Heartland			Newhart	Kate & Allie
	Summer	Kate & Allie (R)	Heartland			Newhart	Doctor Doctor
	Mid-summer	Kate & Allie (R)			Designing Women (R)		Newhart (R)
NBC	Fall	ALF (15/17.5) (Tied with Monday Night Football)	The Hogan Family (22/16.3) (Tied with the NBC Sunday Night Movie and The Wonder Years)	NBC Monday Night at the Movies (25/16.2) (Tied with Amen)
	Spring		Nearly Departed
	Mid-spring		The Hogan Family (22/16.3) (Tied with the NBC Sunday Night Movie and The Wonder Years)

(*) B.L. Stryker, Columbo, Gideon Oliver

Tuesday

Network		8:00 p.m.	8:30 p.m.	9:00 p.m.	9:30 p.m.	10:00 p.m.
ABC	Fall	Who's the Boss? (7/20.8)	Roseanne (2/23.8)	Moonlighting		Thirtysomething
	Winter		The Wonder Years (22/16.3) (Tied with The Hogan Family and the NBC Sunday Night Movie)	Roseanne (2/23.8)	Anything but Love (10/19.0)
	Spring				Have Faith
	Summer				Coach
CBS	Fall	High Risk		CBS Tuesday Movie
	Late fall	TV 101
	Winter	Tour of Duty
	Summer	CBS Summer Playhouse
NBC	Fall	Matlock (13/17.7)		NBC Tuesday Night at the Movies
NBC	Mid-fall	Matlock (13/17.7)		In the Heat of the Night (18/17.3)		Midnight Caller

Wednesday

Network		8:00 p.m.	8:30 p.m.	9:00 p.m.	9:30 p.m.	10:00 p.m.
ABC	Fall	Growing Pains (13/17.6) (Tied with L.A. Law)	Head of the Class (20/17.1)	The Wonder Years (22/16.3) (Tied with The Hogan Family and the NBC Sunday Night Movie)	Hooperman	China Beach
	Spring			Coach	Hooperman
	Mid-spring				The Robert Guillaume Show
	Summer				Hooperman
CBS	Early fall	Live! Dick Clark Presents		The Equalizer		Wiseguy
	Fall	The Van Dyke Show	Annie McGuire
	Winter	TV 101
	Mid-winter	Hard Time on Planet Earth		Jake and the Fatman
NBC	Fall	Unsolved Mysteries (17/17.4)		Night Court (21/16.9)	Baby Boom	Tattingers
	Mid-fall				My Two Dads	Tattingers
	Winter					Nightingales
	Mid-winter					Quantum Leap
	Summer				Knight & Daye	Miami Vice

Thursday

Network		8:00 p.m.	8:30 p.m.	9:00 p.m.	9:30 p.m.	10:00 p.m.
ABC	Fall	Special programming
	Mid-fall	Knightwatch		Dynasty		Special programming
	Winter	A Fine Romance		Dynasty		HeartBeat
	Spring	Thursday Night Baseball
CBS	Fall	48 Hours		CBS Thursday Night Movie
	Mid-fall			Paradise		Knots Landing (27/16.1) (Tied with The CBS Sunday Movie)
	Winter			The Equalizer
	Summer			The Cavanaughs	Coming of Age	The Equalizer (R)
	Mid-summer			The Equalizer		Knots Landing (R)
NBC		The Cosby Show (1/25.6)	A Different World (3/23.0)	Cheers (4/22.3)	Dear John (11/18.5)	L.A. Law (13/17.6) (Tied with Growing Pains)

Friday

Network		8:00 p.m.	8:30 p.m.	9:00 p.m.	9:30 p.m.	10:00 p.m.
ABC	Fall	Perfect Strangers	Full House	Mr. Belvedere	Just the Ten of Us	20/20
ABC	Summer	Full House (R)	Mr. Belvedere (R)	Perfect Strangers (R)	Just the Ten of Us	20/20
CBS	Fall	Beauty and the Beast		Dallas (29/15.4) (Tied with The ABC Mystery Movie)		Falcon Crest
CBS	Summer	Beauty and the Beast		CBS Friday Movie
NBC	Fall	Sonny Spoon		Something Is Out There		Miami Vice
	Winter	Father Dowling Mysteries		Miami Vice		Unsub
	Spring	The Jim Henson Hour		Quantum Leap		Unsub
	Mid-spring	The Jim Henson Hour		Miami Vice		Dream Street
	Summer	Highway to Heaven		NBC Friday Night at the Movies

Saturday

Network		8:00 p.m.	8:30 p.m.	9:00 p.m.	9:30 p.m.	10:00 p.m.
ABC	Fall	Murphy's Law		ABC Saturday Night Movie
	Mid-fall	ABC Saturday Night Movie				Murphy's Law
	Winter	Mission: Impossible		A Man Called Hawk		Murphy's Law
	Spring	Mission: Impossible		A Man Called Hawk		Men
	Mid-spring	A Man Called Hawk		ABC Saturday Night Movie
CBS	Early fall	First Impressions	Frank's Place (R)	Specials		West 57th
	Fall	Dirty Dancing	Raising Miranda	Simon & Simon
	Mid-fall	Live! Dick Clark Presents		Simon & Simon
	Winter	Dolphin Cove		Dirty Dancing	Raising Miranda
	Mid-winter	Dolphin Cove		The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour
	Late winter	TV 101		The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour
	Spring	Paradise		Jesse Hawkes
	Summer	Paradise		Tour of Duty
Fox	Fall	The Reporters		Beyond Tomorrow		Local programming
	Winter	The Reporters		COPS	Beyond Tomorrow
	Spring	COPS	The Reporters		Beyond Tomorrow
NBC	Fall	227	Amen (25/16.2) (Tied with The NBC Monday Movie)	The Golden Girls (6/21.4)	Empty Nest (9/19.2)	Hunter (19/17.2)
	Spring	One of the Boys	Amen (25/16.2) (Tied with The NBC Monday Movie)
	Mid-spring	227	One of the Boys
	Late spring	227	Amen (R)
	Summer	My Two Dads	13 East

Note: On CBS, Frank's Place consisted of reruns of the 1987-88 sitcom. On ABC, ABC Saturday Mystery Movie was supposed to air 9-11 p.m., but production delays amidst the strike force the move to Mondays.

By network

ABC

Returning Series

New Series

Not returning from 1987–88:

CBS

Returning Series

New Series

Not returning from 1987–88:

Fox

Returning Series

New Series

Not returning from 1987–88:

NBC

Returning Series

New Series

Not returning from 1987–88:

Note: The * indicates that the program was introduced in midseason.

+ These shows returned as "backup" programming in midseason.

@ Formerly known as Valerie's Family.

References

Highest-rated series is based on the annual top-rated programs list compiled by Nielsen Media Research and reported in: Brooks, Tim & Marsh, Earle (2007). The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network TV Shows (9th ed.). New York: Ballantine. ISBN 978-0-345-49773-4.
^ "Fall's first draft" (PDF). Broadcasting. May 30, 1988. p. 21. Retrieved November 12, 2023.

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United States network television schedules

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