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Oxygen

Country	United States
Headquarters	Comcast Building, New York City, New York
Programming
Language(s)	English
Picture format	1080i HDTV (downscaled to letterboxed 480i for the SDTV feed)
Ownership
Owner	NBCUniversal (Comcast)
Parent	NBCUniversal Media Group
Sister channels	List Bravo CNBC E! MSNBC NBC Universal Kids USA Network Syfy Telemundo
History
Founded	1998; 26 years ago (1998)
Launched	February 1, 2000; 24 years ago (2000-02-01)
Founder	Geraldine Laybourne Oprah Winfrey Lisa Gersh Marcy Carsey Tom Werner Caryn Mandabach
Links
Website	www.oxygen.com
Availability
Terrestrial
Digital terrestrial television	List Channel 3.5 Charlotte (WBTV) Channel 4.4 Southern California (KNBC, DK41-CB, K25PL-D) Channel 4.4 New York City (WNBC) Channel 4.4 Washington, D.C. (WRC-TV) Channel 4.4 Nashville (WSMV-TV) Channel 5.4 Chicago (WMAQ-TV) Channel 5.4 Memphis (WMC-TV) Channel 5.4 Dallas–Fort Worth (KXTX-TV) Channel 7.6 Tyler (KLTV) Channel 7.7 Greenville (WITN-TV) Channel 8.5 New Orleans (WVUE-DT) Channel 10.4 Philadelphia (WCAU) Channel 13.7 Topeka (WIBW-TV) Channel 14.4 Springfield (WDMR-LD) Channel 15.4 Boston (WNEU) Channel 15.4 Monterey (K15CU-D) Channel 16.6 South Bend (WNDU-TV) Channel 25.5 Denver (KDEN-TV) Channel 30.4 Hartford (WVIT) Channel 33.6 Sacramento–Stockton (KCSO-LD, KMUM-CD, KMMW-LD) Channel 39.4 San Diego (KNSD) Channel 39.5 Las Vegas (KBLR) Channel 39.5 Phoenix (KTAZ) Channel 40.4 Tucson (KHRR) Channel 43.3 Cleveland (WUAB) Channel 45.3 Richmond (WZTD-LD) Channel 47.5 Houston (KTMD) Channel 48.6 San Francisco (KSTS) Channel 51.5 Fresno (KNSO) Channel 60.5 San Antonio (KVDA) Channel 68.5 Milwaukee (WIWN)
Streaming media
Sling, YouTube TV, fuboTV, DirecTV Stream, Hulu + Live TV
ClaroTV+	(requires subscription to access content) ch.185

Oxygen (branded on air as Oxygen True Crime) is an American television network owned by the NBCUniversal Media Group division and business segment of NBCUniversal (NBCU), a subsidiary of Comcast. The channel primarily airs true crime programming and dramas targeted towards women.

The network was founded by Geraldine Laybourne and Oprah Winfrey, and carried a format focused on lifestyle and entertainment programming oriented towards women, similar to competing channels such as Lifetime. NBCU acquired the network in 2007; under NBCU ownership, the network increasingly produced reality shows aimed at the demographic, and was relaunched in 2014 to target a "modern", younger female audience. After the network experienced ratings successes with a programming block dedicated to such programming, Oxygen was relaunched in mid-2017 to focus primarily on true-crime programs. The channel initially operated as a cable network; in 2022, Oxygen began to also operate as a digital multicast television network on subchannels of NBC Owned Television Stations.

As of November 2023, Oxygen is available to approximately 59,000,000 pay television households in the United States, down from its 2012 peak of 80,000,000 households. Under its current format, the network primarily competes with Investigation Discovery and HLN.

History

The privately held company Oxygen Media was founded in 1998 by former Nickelodeon executive Geraldine Laybourne, talk-show host Oprah Winfrey, media executive Lisa Gersh, and producers Marcy Carsey, Tom Werner and Caryn Mandabach (of Carsey-Werner fame). Laybourne was the service's founder, chairwoman, and CEO, staying with the channel until the NBCUniversal sale. The company's subscription network Oxygen launched on February 1, 2000.

The channel's first headquarters were at Battery Park City in New York City, near the World Trade Center. It was knocked off the air on September 11, 2001; the Time Warner Cable-owned regional news channel NY1 was broadcast to all Oxygen subscribers across the country until the studio reopened within a week after the attack.

In mid-2000s, it was purchased by The Walt Disney Company in Oxygen's stake.

The network's operations were later consolidated in the Chelsea Market, a former Nabisco factory at 15th Street and Ninth Avenue in New York City. Oxygen's operations are now based at 30 Rockefeller Plaza as part of Comcast's consolidation of its newly owned NBC Universal properties.

The channel originally began as an interactive service focusing on original programming with some reruns (such as Kate & Allie), and featured a black bar at the bottom of the screen (referred to as "the stripe", occupying the bottom 12% of the screen) which would show various information (the interactive part involved the channel's website); the technique was cloned by Spike's precursor The New TNN; the stripe was eventually dropped. Prior to 2005, the channel carried a limited schedule of regular season WNBA games produced by NBA TV. The channel later began to focus chiefly on reality shows, reruns, and movies. For a time during the talk show's syndication run, Oxygen aired week-delayed repeats of The Tyra Banks Show. The yoga/meditation/exercise program Inhale was the last inaugural Oxygen program on air into the channel's NBC Universal era, albeit in repeats; it was cancelled in 2010.

Campus Ladies, Bliss, Oprah After the Show, Talk Sex with Sue Johanson, The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency, Snapped, Girls Behaving Badly and Bad Girls Club, a reality series, were the highlight shows of the network at this time. Oxygen launched with immediate DirecTV carriage, and arrived on Dish Network in early 2006 during that provider's carriage conflict with Lifetime.

Acquisition by NBC Universal

On October 9, 2007, NBC Universal announced it would be buying Oxygen from The Walt Disney Company for $925 million. The sale was completed on November 20, 2007. NBC Universal's cable division announced at an industry upfront presentation on April 23, 2008, that the channel would rebrand and unveil a new logo on June 17, 2008; in the months since the sale the Oh! heading was dropped from the channel's visual branding. The logo premiered one week early on June 8, 2008.

For the 2008 Summer Olympics, Oxygen aired events and programming weeknights relating to gymnastics, equestrian, and synchronized swimming through NBC's Olympic broadcasts. On June 29, 2009, Oxygen premiered Dance Your Ass Off, a reality dance competition series where obese or overweight contestants competed to perform dance routines with professional partners., all while also trying to lose the highest percentage of weight relative to their initial weight. It was Oxygen's highest-rated series premiere to-date, with an average of 1.3 million viewers On April 5, 2010, Oxygen launched its second night of original programming with the fifth-season premiere of Tori & Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood.

Following the acquisition of NBC Universal by Comcast and the last-minute replacement of its subscription channel Style Network with Esquire Network (which was originally intended to replace G4) on September 23, 2013, some of its acquired programs were dispersed to Oxygen.

In April 2014, as part of a gradual re-focusing of NBCU's women's pay-TV networks by new division head Bonnie Hammer, and the appointment of Frances Berwick as the head of Oxygen and sister network Bravo, it was revealed that Oxygen would undergo a shift in its programming strategy to focus on a "modern", young female audience. Berwick explained that the new slate, which included upcoming series such as Fix My Choir, Funny Girls, Nail'd It, Sisterhood of Hip Hop, Street Art Throwdown, and planned spin-offs of Preachers of L.A., would "deliver on the freshness, authenticity, high emotional stakes and optimism that this demographic is looking for", and that many of the new programs would "appeal to things that are important in the lives of young, millennial women" and be "authentic". As part of the re-focusing, the network also introduced a new slogan, "Very Real".

Refocus on true crime

In December 2016, it was reported that NBCUniversal was considering reformatting Oxygen as a true crime-oriented channel. Since 2015, the genre had seen growing interest, especially among young adult women. The network had introduced a primetime block known as Crime Time on Fridays through Mondays (anchored by series such as Snapped), which had helped Oxygen see a 42% increase in total viewership, and a 22% increase among women 25–54. NBCUniversal had reportedly been in talks with Dick Wolf—producer of NBC's Law & Order and Chicago franchises—to take an equity stake in a re-branded channel that could be led by reruns of the programs. In January 2017, the network also began a related foray into podcasting, with the true crime series Martinis & Murder.

In February 2017, NBCUniversal confirmed that it planned to re-format Oxygen with a focus on true crime programming aimed towards women. The change was accompanied by a larger re-branding later in the year, with new police tape-inspired logo. Oxygen's new lineup was built largely around its existing library of unscripted true-crime programming (such as Snapped), and reruns of police procedurals such as the CSI and NCIS franchises. Berwick stated that the network had not determined the fate of the network's non-crime programming, such as Bad Girls Club, after the full re-branding takes effect.

During its upfront presentations, Oxygen unveiled other new crime programs that were in development for the upcoming season, such the new Dick Wolf series Criminal Confessions, a docuseries on the murder of Jessica Chambers co-produced with NBCUniversal-funded BuzzFeed, and a new season of Wolf's Cold Justice (which had been cancelled by TNT). In September 2017, Oxygen and USA Network acquired off-network reruns of Chicago P.D., which were added to their schedules in October 2017.

International

On October 17, 2024, NBCUniversal announced an agreement with Bell Media to launch a Canadian version of Oxygen on January 1, 2025. The channel will be a relaunch of its similarly-formatted Investigation Discovery, following Bell's loss of rights to Warner Bros. Discovery factual channel brands to Rogers Media.

Programming

Current

• Kill or Be Killed
• Buried in the Backyard
• 911 Crisis Center
• Cold Justice
• Dateline: Secrets Uncovered
• Dateline: Unforgettable
• Homicide for the Holidays
• Killer Siblings
• Snapped
• Mark of a Killer
• Final Moments
• Accident, Suicide or Murder
• The Real Murders of Orange County
• The Real Murders of Atlanta
• The Real Murders of Los Angeles
• Blood & Money
• Living with a Serial Killer
• Snapped: Killer Couples
• Twisted Killers
• Floribama Murders
• Fatal Family Feuds
• Prosecuting Evil with Kelly Siegler
• Sin City Murders
• Sins of the South
• Deadly Waters With Captain Lee
• A Plan To Kill
• Philly Homicide

Past

• 50 Funniest Women Alive
• Addicted to Beauty
• All About Aubrey
• All My Babies' Mamas
• All the Right Moves
• As She Sees It
• Bachelorette Party: Las Vegas
• Bad Girls All-Star Battle
• Bad Girls Club
• Bad Girls Club: Afterparty
• Bad Girls Club: Flo Gets Married
• Bad Girls Road Trip
• Battle of the Ex Besties
• Behind the Shield
• Best Ink
• Birth Stories
• Bliss
• Breaking Up with Shannen Doherty
• Breakup Girl
• Bring Home the Exotic
• Brooklyn 11223
• Campus Ladies
• Can You Tell?
• Candice Checks It Out
• Captured
• Celebrities Undercover
• Chasing Maria Menounos
• Cheryl Richardson's Lifestyle Makeovers
• Choose to Lead
• Coolio's Rules
• Conversations from the Edge with Carrie Fisher
• Criminal Confessions
• The DNA of Murder with Paul Holes
• Daily Remix
• Dance Your Ass Off
• Deadly Cults
• Death at the Mansion: Rebecca Zahau
• Debbie Travis' Painted House
• Deion & Pilar: Prime Time Love
• The Disappearance of Crystal Rogers
• The Disappearance of Maura Murray
• The Disappearance of Natalee Holloway
• The Disappearance of Phoenix Coldon
• The Disappearance of Susan Cox Powell
• Dogs with Jobs
• Douglas Family Gold
• Drastic Plastic Surgery
• Dying to Belong
• Eavesdropping with Alan Cummings
• eLove
• Exhale with Candice Bergen
• The Face
• Facelift
• Fight Girls
• Find Me My Man
• Fix My Choir
• Fix My Mom
• Florida Man Murders
• The Forgotten West Memphis Three
• Framed By The Killer
• Freeride with Greta Gaines
• Funny Girls
• The Girl In the Picture
• Girlfriend Confidential: LA
• Girls Behaving Badly
• The Glee Project
• Good Girls Don't
• Hair Battle Spectacular
• Hey Monie!
• Hollywood Unzipped: Stylist Wars
• House of Glam
• In Ice Cold Blood
• Injustice with Nancy Grace
• It Takes a Killer
• I'm Having Their Baby
• Inhale Yoga with Steve Ross
• The Isaac Mizrahi Show
• Inshallah: Diary of an Afghan Woman
• Ivana Young Man
• I've Got a Secret
• Jane By Design
• Janice & Abbey
• The Janice Dickinson Modeling Agency
• Jersey Couture
• The Jury Speaks
• Just Cause
• ka-Ching
• Keisha and Kaseem
• Kids Behaving Badly
• Killer Affair
• Killer Motive
• Killerpost
• Killision Course
• Kim Kardashian West: The Justice Project
• Last Squad Standing
• Laura Pedersen's Your Money and Your Life
• License to Kill
• A Lie to Die For
• Life & Style
• Life's a Bitch
• Like A Boss
• Living Different
• Living With Funny
• Love Games: Bad Girls Need Love Too
• Making It Big
• Man Talk with Carrie Fisher
• Me Time
• Mo'Nique's Fat Chance
• Movies@Oxygen
• Mr. Romance
• Murdered by Morning
• My Big Fat Revenge
• My Crazy Love
• My Shopping Addiction
• Murder and Justice: The Case of Martha Moxley
• Nail'd It!
• Naked Josh
• The Naughty Kitchen with Chef Blythe Beck
• The Next Big Thing: NY
• Nice Package
• O2Be
• Oprah After the Show
• Oprah Goes Online
• Our Bodies, Myself (web series only)
• Oxygen Movies
• Oxygen Sports
• Oxygen's 25iest
• Pajama Party
• Peep Show (as the first US telecaster; the UK sitcom was initially paired with the Canadian Show Me Yours as a Saturday-night provocative comedy bloc.)
• Player Gets Played
• Policewomen Files
• Pond Life
• The Prancing Elites Project
• Preachers of Atlanta
• Preachers of Detroit
• Preachers of L.A.
• Pretty Wicked
• Pure Oxygen
• Quigley's Village
• Real Families
• Relentless
• Real Weddings From the Knot
• Repo Girls
• Ripe Tomatoes
• Running Russell Simmons
• SheCommerce
• Show Me Yours
• Sisterhood of Hip Hop
• Skin Deep
• Snapped: She Made Me Do It
• Sports Aside
• Show Me Yours
• Street Art Throwdown
• Strut
• Sunday Night Sex Show
• Talk Sex with Sue Johanson
• Tanisha Gets Married
• Tattoos After Dark
• Tease
• Three Days to Live
• Too Young to Marry?
• Top Model Obsessed
• Tracey Ullman's Visible Panty Lines
• Trackers
• Tori & Dean: Home Sweet Hollywood
• Tori & Dean: Inn Love
• Tori & Dean: sTORIbook Weddings
• Trippin' with May Lee
• An Unexpected Killer
• Unprotected
• Unspeakable Crime: The Killing of Jessica Chambers
• Up and Vanished
• Use Your Life
• Violent Minds: Killers on Tape
• A Wedding and a Murder
• We Sweat
• Who Cares About Girls?
• Who Does She Think She Is?
• Who Needs Hollywood?
• Women and the Badge
• The World According to Paris
• Worst.Post.Ever, with Frankie Grande
• Worth the Risk
• X-Chromosome
• You're on TV

Syndicated

• Absolutely Fabulous
• America's Got Talent
• America's Next Top Model
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer
• Burn Notice
• Chicago P.D.
• CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
• Cybill
• A Different World
• Ellen
• The Ellen DeGeneres Show
• The Gospel Bill Show
• Glee
• Grace Under Fire
• House
• Kate & Allie
• La Femme Nikita
• Law & Order: Criminal Intent
• Living Single
• Mad About You
• Minute to Win It
• My Wife and Kids
• NCIS
• Ned and Stacey
• Nighty Night
• Roseanne
• Suburban Shootout
• Xena: Warrior Princess

Oxygen HD

Oxygen HD was launched in March 2011 as high definition simulcast feed, eventually becoming the main feed with the standard definition feed being originated at the cable provider headend through downscaling. It is available through most providers.

Over-the-air affiliates

On May 2, 2022, NBC Owned Television Stations began to carry Oxygen as a subchannel on digital terrestrial television, primarily on NBC and Telemundo owned and operated stations. However, during 2024, Gray Television began adding the network to their stations.

References

1. "U.S. cable network households (universe), 1990 – 2023". wrestlenomics.com. May 14, 2024. Retrieved July 28, 2019.
2. Boboltz, Sara (July 6, 2017). "The Oxygen Channel Is Becoming A True-Crime, All The Time Network". HuffPost. Retrieved July 20, 2017.
3. "Lisa Gersh Profile". Bloomberg L.P.
4. "Oxygen Media Transmits New York One Signal to Its National Subscribers – New York Business Wire – September 13, 2001".
5. Learmonth, Michael (October 10, 2007). "NBC U Sucks in Oxygen". Daily Variety. p. 1.
6. "Show Tracker". The Los Angeles Times. April 23, 2008.
7. Nordyke, Kimberly. "Oxygen rebrand caters to 'Generation O'". The Hollywood Reporter. Archived from the original on April 24, 2008.
8. ""Dance Your Ass Off" Sets Oxygen Record As Network's Best Series Premiere Ever". HuffPost. 2009-07-31. Retrieved 2024-12-17.
9. Rose, Lacey (September 9, 2013). "NBCU Switch-Up: Esquire Network to Take Over Style, Not G4 (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter.
10. ^ Goldberg, Lesley (April 8, 2014). "Oxygen Orders Seven New Series, Sets Network Rebranding". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved April 8, 2014.
11. ^ Goldberg, Lesley (September 24, 2014). "Oxygen Adds Five Series Ahead of Rebrand, Including Kardashian Minister Docuseries (Exclusive)". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved April 2, 2017.
12. ^ Littleton, Cynthia (February 1, 2017). "Oxygen Surrenders to Crime Wave in Programming Strategy Revamp". Variety. Retrieved February 3, 2017.
13. Andreeva, Nellie (December 12, 2016). "Oxygen Eyes Crime-Themed Makeover". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved January 19, 2017.
14. Littleton, Cynthia (December 12, 2016). "NBCUniversal, Dick Wolf in Talks to Transform Oxygen Into Crime-Centric Channel (EXCLUSIVE)". Variety. Retrieved January 19, 2017.
15. Peterson, Tim (March 11, 2019). "'On the precipice of being a real business': NBCU's Oxygen wants to make money from podcasts". Digiday. Retrieved February 12, 2020.
16. Petski, Denise (May 11, 2017). "Oxygen Expands Crime Programming Slate With Projects From Ice-T, Nancy Grace & More". Deadline Hollywood. Retrieved May 13, 2017.
17. ^ Stanhope, Kate (May 10, 2017). "Oxygen Teams With Dick Wolf, Nancy Grace, Ice-T for Crime-Centered Slate". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved May 11, 2017.
18. Umstead, Thomas (February 1, 2017). "Oxygen to Rebrand as A True Crime Channel". Multichannel News. Retrieved February 3, 2017.
19. ^ Goldberg, Lesley (February 1, 2017). "Oxygen Officially Rebranding as Crime-Focused Network". The Hollywood Reporter. United States. Archived from the original on February 1, 2017. Retrieved March 14, 2017.
20. Littleton, Cynthia (September 23, 2017). "USA and Oxygen Acquire Rerun Rights to 'Chicago P.D.'". Variety. Retrieved December 20, 2017.
21. Hurley, Laura (December 18, 2017). "NCIS: New Orleans And Chicago P.D. Just Landed Big Syndication Deals". Cinema Blend. Retrieved December 20, 2017.
22. Thiessen, Connie (2024-10-17). "Bell to bring USA Network, Oxygen True Crime to Canada". Broadcast Dialogue. Retrieved 2024-10-17.
23. Carlson, Adam (August 21, 2017). "The Mystery of Maura Murray, College Student Who Suddenly Vanished After 2004 Crash". People. United States. Retrieved August 22, 2017.
24. Bibel, Sara (January 7, 2013). "Oxygen Picks Up 'Fat Girl Revenge,' 'Find Me My Man,' & 'Too Young To Marry?'". TV By the Numbers. Archived from the original on January 11, 2013. Retrieved January 7, 2013.
25. Yohannes, Alamin (August 9, 2016). "Oxygen's Trans Reality Show 'Strut' to Debut in September". NBC News. Retrieved August 12, 2015.
26. "TIME WARNER CABLE EXPANDS HIGH-DEFINITION CHANNEL LINE UP FOR NEW YORK CITY CUSTOMERS | Time Warner Cable | New York City". Time Warner Cable. Archived from the original on March 20, 2012. Retrieved March 4, 2011.
27. Oxygen Staff (May 2, 2022). "Think You Don't Have Access To Oxygen Hits Like 'Snapped' And 'Dateline'? Think Again". Oxygen Official Site. Archived from the original on 2022-05-02. Retrieved 2022-07-26.
28. "Stations for Network - Oxygen". RabbitEars. Retrieved August 22, 2024.

External links

• Official website

• Television networks in the United States
• NBCUniversal networks
• Lists of American television network affiliates
• Former subsidiaries of The Walt Disney Company
• Television channels and stations established in 2000
• English-language television stations in the United States
• Women's interest channels
• True crime