Sky Reveals First HDR Sport Broadcast Plans

A couple of days ago news leaked out across multiple platforms (as reported here) revealing that British satellite broadcaster Sky was about to introduce support for high dynamic range to its service from Wednesday, May 27. 

This leaked information, though, was missing a couple of key bits of information. One was an exact list by hardware version number of which Sky Q receivers will be able to handle the new HLG HDR content that’s arriving via the new Sky Nature channel on Wednesday. The other was any mention of Sky’s HDR plans with regard to the jewel in its content crown, sport.

Sky has been in touch since my first story published on Saturday to say that while it doesn’t intend to share a full list of compatible Sky Q hardware until Wednesday, it does have a target in mind for launching live HDR sports broadcasts. And that target is a big one: the 2021 Summer Olympics.

The Olympics were moved to 2021 from this summer, of course, in response to the Coronavirus pandemic. But while this might have been a crushing if understandable blow for sports fans desperately looking for some live sport to keep them going through lockdown measures, it seems to have thrown up an opportunity for Sky to kick off its live HDR sports coverage with the biggest sporting event on the planet.

Though it’s worth noting that the BBC usually shows all live Olympics coverage in the UK, so maybe Sky will just be carrying the BBC’s HLG HDR feeds?

The 2021 Olympics aren’t scheduled to start (Coronavirus permitting) until July 23 2021, so if Sky is, as it states in its latest official update, targeting that for its live HDR broadcast debut, then it would seem that Sky subscribers with compatible TVs and Sky Q receivers shouldn’t expect to see any live HDR Sky sport broadcasts ahead of that date. Meaning there won’t be any HDR coverage of the 2020-2021 football (soccer) season - unless, maybe, Sky shows the occasional game in HDR as a trial. 

This may come as a disappointment to Sky subscribers who’ve been waiting for HDR since Sky first announced it was working on it way back in February 2018. But hopefully the HDR Sky Original shows and blockbuster movies Sky is promising to add before Christmas will still give AV fans plenty to enjoy on top to the 11 hours of HDR content (five one-hour episodes of Gangs Of Lemur Island, one hour-long episode of Pridelands: Wilderness Reborn and five one-hour episodes of Malawi: Wildlife Rescue) arriving on Wednesday.

Keep an eye on my Forbes Channel or Twitter feed for a further update on which Sky Q receivers can and can’t handle HDR in the next couple of days.

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