MGM HD

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MGM HD
Country
Headquarters
Programming
Picture format1080i (HDTV)
Ownership
Owner
History
Launched
  • December 7, 2006; 17 years ago (2006-12-07) (Poland)
  • October 10, 2007; 16 years ago (2007-10-10) (United States)
  • October 10, 2007; 16 years ago (2007-10-10) (Latin America)
  • December 14, 2009; 14 years ago (2009-12-14) (United Kingdom & Ireland)
  • June 7, 2010; 13 years ago (2010-06-07) (Germany)
Closed
  • January 16, 2014; 10 years ago (2014-01-16) (United Kingdom and Ireland)
  • May 16, 2016; 7 years ago (2016-05-16) (Poland)
  • January 2, 2017; 7 years ago (2017-01-02) (Germany)
  • January 1, 2019; 5 years ago (2019-01-01) (Russia and CIS)
  • October 31, 2022; 17 months ago (2022-10-31) (United States)[1]
Replaced byAMC (Poland)
Hollywood HD (Russia and CIS)
MGM+ (United States)
Links
WebsiteMGMHD.com
Availability

MGM HD was an all high-definition television cable network owned by the MGM HD Productions subsidiary of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), a division of Amazon's MGM Holdings, Inc. It featured movies from the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer library of 1,200 movies mastered in a high-definition-compatible format.[2] The films were usually presented uncut and in their original aspect ratio, although some films were edited for content for daytime viewing and commercial breaks were often added during peak viewing hours. MGM HD offered programming like the MGM Channel which was available in 110 countries.

Carriage[edit]

United States[edit]

At closing, the network was available via AT&T U-verse, DirecTV, Charter Spectrum, Mediacom, and Frontier FiOS and Philo in the United States. MGM HD was removed from the Comcast Xfinity channel lineup in February 2019.[3] The network was removed from Verizon FiOS at the start of 2021, while Dish removed it on August 31, 2022.

On October 25, it was confirmed that Amazon would shut down MGM HD on October 31; its assets were merged onto sister service Epix, which re-branded as MGM+ on January 15, 2023.[1]

Europe[edit]

The N satellite service in Poland carries MGM HD.[4] It was launched on December 7, 2006, in Poland.

In the United Kingdom, MGM HD launched on 14 December 2009 on the Sky UK satellite service.[5] The channel was run in partnership with Sky. On 27 April 2011, the channel was added to UPC Ireland's lineup. On 16 January 2014, MGM HD ceased broadcasting in the UK and Ireland.[6] MGM continued to be available on the UPC (rebranded to Virgin Media Ireland in 2015) service in Ireland on channel 326 until it was removed in January 2018. MGM Germany was closed at the end of 2016.

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b Keys, Matthew (October 25, 2022). "Amazon to shut down MGM HD cable movie channel". The Desk. Retrieved October 26, 2022.
  2. ^ "MGM Eyes HDTV Movie Channel". Archived from the original on December 14, 2007. Retrieved October 11, 2007.
  3. ^ "Comcast Drops MGM HD... Finally". 2 February 2019.
  4. ^ "MGM Networks and leading Polish media and entertainment group, ITI, to launch movie channel". Retrieved November 16, 2006.
  5. ^ "MGM HD channel launches on Sky". Digital Spy. 14 December 2009.
  6. ^ "MGM HD CLOSURE - MGM Channel". www.mgmchannel.co.uk. Archived from the original on 2014-02-22.