5Action TV Guide: Listings, Schedule & What’s On 5Action Tonight

5Action is Channel 5’s cop-show and action channel, and it has had more names than most channels manage in a decade: Spike at launch in 2015, 5Spike from 2017, merged with the UK’s Paramount Network in 2020, and 5Action since January 2022. Tonight, Thursday 15 October 2026, it is Police Interceptors at 6pm and 7pm, Motorway Cops at 8pm, another Police Interceptors at 9pm, Timber Titans at 10pm and The X-Files at 11pm.

5Action Schedule: Thursday 15 October 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete 5Action schedule for Thursday 15 October 2026, on Freeview 33.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

Also on TV tonight at 9pm

• BBC One: The Celebrity Traitors (from 8pm)
• ITV1: Long Lost Family
• BBC Two: Surgeons: At the Edge of Life
• Channel 4: Our Tiny Islands (from 8pm)
• Channel 5: Love Nature
• Film4: Wrath of Man
• E4: Gogglebox
• ITV2: Big Brother
• ITV3: Vera (from 8pm)
• ITV4: Benidorm

Every channel tonight, side by side · Films on TV tonight · Tomorrow’s TV

What’s on 5Action today

Thursday starts with Warship: Life at Sea at midnight, then Ice Road Truckers at 1am and Trucking Hell at 2am and 3am. Teleshopping runs from 4am and Cruise TV with LoveitBookit fills 7am and 8am.

The morning has Trucking Hell at 9am and Police Interceptors at 10am and 11am. The afternoon belongs to two westerns, The Outcast from noon and The Jayhawkers! from 1:55pm, each split by an Entertainment News on 5 bulletin. Traffic Cops has 4pm, and the evening policing run starts at 5pm with Motorway Cops.

5Action tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the 5Action primetime line-up for tonight, Thursday 15 October 2026.

Police Interceptors — 5Action, 6pm

Series 4, episode 4 follows officers as they run down a driver who tries to escape on foot. It is the first of two older-series episodes back to back.

Police Interceptors — 5Action, 7pm

Episode 5 of the same series has a drug dealer who has been driving dangerously pulled over.

Motorway Cops: Catching Britain’s Speeders — 5Action, 8pm

Series 8, episode 5 joins Humberside Police, where PC Joe Gorman races to catch a driver reported as drunk at the wheel. Series 8 is a fresh run for this show, and episode 1 went out at 5pm.

Police Interceptors — 5Action, 9pm

A far more recent run than the 6pm and 7pm episodes: series 25, episode 9 starts with a lorry driver turning the wrong way into oncoming traffic on the A43, and the incident grows from there.

Timber Titans — 5Action, 10pm

The logging series changes the pace. In series 2, episode 6 the Peters crew deals with some of the biggest trees of the season.

The X-Files — 5Action, 11pm

“Je Souhaite” is series 7, episode 21, the one where Mulder is granted three wishes after he and Scully are called in over a man whose mouth has vanished.

What kind of shows are on 5Action

Cop shows and roads policing documentaries

This is the channel, really. Police Interceptors, Traffic Cops and Motorway Cops: Catching Britain’s Speeders between them account for most of the grid, and they are built to an identical template: dashcam and body-cam footage, a narrator over the top, and the officer explaining afterwards what made them look twice. John Thomson narrates one, Jamie Theakston another, Nicky Campbell the third, and that voice is often the quickest way to work out which show you have actually landed on.

Action films and westerns

Older genre cinema fills the afternoons, mostly westerns. Gunsmoke, The Walking Hills and Horizons West come round often, usually split either side of a news bulletin. A full western occasionally makes it into an evening slot, but not often.

Heavy recovery and trucking documentaries

Highway Thru Hell, Trucking Hell and Outback Truckers cover the same job on three continents: British roadsides, the Australian outback, the Canadian mountain passes. Highway Thru Hell is the best of them when it appears, and it usually gets an evening slot rather than being buried overnight.

How to watch 5Action

Channel numbers

Here’s where to find 5Action across the main UK television platforms:

5Action is free on all of the above platforms, with no subscription required. Virgin Media and Freesat numbers can vary slightly by region and box, so your on-screen guide is the definitive source if these don’t match.

Streaming online

5Action streams live and free through 5, Channel 5’s combined broadcast and streaming platform, at channel5.com and via the 5 app on smart TVs, iOS, Android and Amazon Fire TV. The service was known as My5 until Channel 5 merged its linear channels and catch-up library into the single “5” brand in March 2025. A free account is all you need, and recent episodes of shows like Police Interceptors and Highway Thru Hell are generally available to catch up on afterwards.

5Action sister channels

5Action sits under Channel 5 Broadcasting Limited, itself part of Paramount Skydance Corporation, alongside three siblings. 5USA runs American crime dramas and imported US series, so it is far more scripted than anything here. 5Star does reality and true crime, personality-led where 5Action is all dashcam and recovery trucks. Channel 5 is the flagship and takes the group’s biggest dramas, documentaries and 5 News; the other three pick up the specialisms it does not have room for.

Frequently asked questions

What channel is 5Action on?

Freeview 33, Sky 150 (Sky Q) or 165 (Sky Glass and Sky Stream), Virgin Media 150 in HD or 187 in SD, and Freesat 132.

What’s on 5Action tonight?

On Thursday 15 October, Police Interceptors is on at 6pm and 7pm, Motorway Cops: Catching Britain’s Speeders at 8pm, Police Interceptors at 9pm, Timber Titans at 10pm and The X-Files at 11pm. Full times are in the schedule table above.

Is 5Action free to watch?

Yes, completely free to air with no subscription, though it carries advertising and teleshopping strands throughout the schedule, particularly during the day.

Can I watch 5Action online for free?

Yes. It streams live at channel5.com and through the 5 app, the platform formerly known as My5. A free account is all that’s required.

Verdict

Thursday is a policing night with a logging detour: Police Interceptors twice early on, Motorway Cops, a third Police Interceptors, then Timber Titans, with The X-Files to close. Nothing is live and nothing needs following from week to week.

Before that, daytime runs Cruise TV with LoveitBookit through breakfast, then Trucking Hell and Police Interceptors in the morning and two westerns in the afternoon.

Related: Channel 5 TV Guide | Freeview Channel Guide | Tonight’s Films on Freeview