Nickelodeon

**Nickelodeon** (nicknamed **Nick**) is an American pay television channel and the flagship property of Nickelodeon Group, a sub-division of the Paramount Media Networks division of Paramount Skydance Corporation. Launched on April 1, 1979, as the first cable channel for children, it is primarily aimed at children and adolescents aged 2 to 17, along with a broader family audience through its programming blocks.

The channel began as a test broadcast on December 1, 1977, as part of QUBE, an early cable television system broadcast locally in Columbus, Ohio. On April 1, 1979, the channel was renamed Nickelodeon and launched to a new nationwide audience, with _Pinwheel_ as its inaugural program. The network was initially commercial-free and remained without advertising until 1984. Nickelodeon gained a rebranding in programming and image that year, and its ensuing success led to it and its sister networks MTV and VH1 being sold to Viacom in 1985.

Nickelodeon began expanding as a franchise model with the addition of sister channels and program blocks. Nick Jr. launched as preschool morning block on January 4, 1988, and was eventually spun-off into the Nick Jr. Channel in 2009. Nicktoons, based on the flagship brand for Nickelodeon original animated series, launched as a standalone channel in 2002. Noggin, an interactive educational brand created in partnership with Sesame Workshop, existed as a television channel from 1999 to 2009 and a mobile streaming service from 2015 to 2024. Two blocks aimed at teenage audiences, Nickelodeon's TEENick and Noggin's The N, were merged to form the TeenNick channel in 2009.

As of December 2023, Nickelodeon was available to approximately 70 million pay television households in the United States, down from its peak of 101 million households in 2011.

## Programming

Programming seen on Nickelodeon includes animated series (such as _SpongeBob SquarePants_, _The Patrick Star Show_,  _Rugrats_, Rock, Paper Scissors, _Kamp Koral: SpongeBob's Under Years_, _The Loud House_, _The Casagrandes_,   _The Smurfs_ and _Big Nate_), live-action, scripted series (such as _Danger Force_, _Tyler Perry's Young Dylan_ and _All That_), and original made-for-TV movies, while the network's morning schedule is dedicated to shows targeting preschool children (such as _Blue's Clues & You!_, _Team Umizoomi_, _Bubble Guppies_ and _PAW Patrol_).

### Nicktoons

**Nicktoons** is the branding for Nickelodeon's original animated television series. Until 1991, the animated series that aired on Nickelodeon were largely imported from foreign countries, with some original animated specials that were also featured on the channel up to that point. On August 11, 1991, Nickelodeon debuted its first three original animated shows. They are _Doug_, _Rugrats_ and _The Ren & Stimpy Show_. Since then, the network debuted more original Nicktoons and even started an animation studio in 1998, called Nickelodeon Animation Studio.

Though the Nicktoons branding has seldom been used by the network itself since the 2002 launch of the channel of the same name, original animated series continue to make up a substantial portion of Nickelodeon's lineup. Roughly 6 to 7 hours of these programs are seen on the weekday schedule and around nine hours on weekends, including a dedicated weekend morning animation block.

### Nick at Nite

**Nick at Nite** is a programming block for adults and older youth audiences.The block was founded in 1985, as a replacement to the short-lived A&E block on Nick from 1984 to 1985 (A&E is now a 24/7 channel independent from Nickelodeon). This block is similar to Adult Swim, the nighttime programming block for Cartoon Network.

### Nick Jr. Channel

The **Nick Jr. Channel** is a channel for children aged 2 through 6. It was based on Nick Jr., founded on January 4, 1988 as a morning programming block. A channel called the Nick Jr. Channel was launched on September 28, 2009. In the same year, the original Nick Jr. logo was discontinued on the block, following the decline of Noggin.

### NickToons

**NickToons** was a programming block founded on August 11, 1991, the same day _Doug_, _Rugrats_, and _The Ren & Stimpy Show_ started. The programming block was repeated every Saturday and Sunday. Since 2002, Nickelodeon airs their Nicktoons scattered (sometimes even taking up all of the channel). A still-airing channel called Nicktoons was launched in 2002. The channel is for children ages 7 through 14. In the summer of 2025, it was rebranded as NickSpongebob and showed SpongeBob Squarepants 24/7.

### TeenNick

**TeenNick** is a channel for teens originally for ages 13 through 19. It was started as a block on Nickelodeon called TEENick, which was founded in 2001. This block was for teenage audiences. The channel launched on September 28, 2009. It had shows such as Drake & Josh, iCarly, _Danger Force_, _Tyler Perry's Young Dylan_ and _All That_ and original made-for-TV movies.

### NickMusic

**NickMusic** is a channel that launched in 2002 as MTV Hits, a spin-off to MTV. It was changed in 2016 as NickMusic.

### NickRewind

**NickRewind** was a block on TeenNick from 2019 through 2022 and Nick at Nite since 2023 on weekdays, that launched in 2011 on TeenNick. It showed re-runs of old Nickelodeon shows like _Ren & Stimpy_.

## Nickelodeon anniversaries

- Nick at Nite's 10th anniversary
    - The Dick Van Dyke Show It May Look Like a Walnut
    - Bewitched A Is for Aardvark
    - Mary Tyler Moore Show Chuckles Bites the Dust
    - The Bob Newhart Show Over the River and Through the Woods
    - Green Acres The Day the Pigs Went Wild
    - I Love Lucy Lucy Goes to Hollywood
    - The Munsters A Visit from Dracula
    - Welcome Back Kotter Kotter's Return
    - F-Troop The Great Troop Robbery
    - Donna Reed Show The Maid Who Came to Dinner
- Nickelodeon's 20th anniversary
    - Rugrats All Growed Up
    - Rugrats Runaway Reptar
    - Hey Arnold Helga Blabs It All
    - Hey Arnold Married
    - The Angry Beavers Muscular Beavers
    - The Angry Beavers Beach Beavers A-Go-Go
    - Rocko's Modern Life Clean Lovin'
    - Rocko's Modern Life Ed Good, Rocko Bad
    - CatDog CatDog's End
    - The Wild Thornberrys Forget Me Not
    - The Secret World of Alex Mack The Secret
    - Kenan & Kel Two Heads Are Better Than One
    - SpongeBob SquarePants Help Wanted/Reef Blowers/Tea at the Treedome
    - SpongeBob SquarePants Bubblestand/Ripped Pants
    - Rocket Power New Squid on the Block/Down the Drain
    - The Amanda Show Pilot
    - 100 Deeds for Eddie McDowd Pilot
    - Little Bill The Treasure Hunt/The Best Way to Play
    - All That Episode 50
    - Figure It Out Season 3 Episode 1

## Related pages

- List of programs broadcast by Nickelodeon
- List of movies by Nickelodeon
- Nicktoons
- Nick.com
- The Club (Nickelodeon)
- MTV
- Nick Jr. Channel
- NickRewind Jr. (United States)

## Other websites

- Official site (United States)
- Official site (United Kingdom)

## Infobox (television channel)

- **name**: Nickelodeon
- **logo**: Nickelodeon 2023 logo (outline).svg
- **logo caption**: Logo used since 2023
- **founder**: Vivian Horner
- **owner**: Paramount Skydance Corporation
- **parent**: Nickelodeon Group
- **picture format**: 1080i HDTV
- **country**: United States
- **area**: United States
- **headquarters**: One Astor Plaza
New York City, U.S.
- **former names**: C-3
- **availability note**:

- **online chan 1**: Philo (company), Philo, FuboTV, YouTube TV, Hulu#Hulu + Live TV service, Hulu + Live TV