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. Thursday night runs the usual pursuit-heavy line-up, with the schedule below.

5Action Schedule: Thursday 13 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete 5Action schedule for Thursday 13 August 2026, on Freeview 33.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on 5Action today

The overnight schedule opens with World’s Deadliest Weather: Caught on Camera at 12am (series 6, episode 3): British holidaymakers flee a wildfire tearing through Rhodes, and a Colorado hailstorm turns an open-air concert into an unplanned spectacle. Outback Truckers follows at 1am (series 3, episode 5), Steve stuck on a tricky desert-island delivery, Yogi running low on road and two concrete specialists straying off the map. Two Trucking Heavy episodes fill 2am and 3am (series 3, episodes 16 and 17): Big Andy wrestling a huge excavator onto his trailer in Somerset when the hydraulics jam, then Ant and Layton hauling a retired British Rail shunter locomotive round a tight country lane that tests rookie Layton’s steering. Entertainment News on 5 closes the block at 3:50am, and teleshopping runs through to 7am.

Cruise TV with LoveitBookit takes 7am and 8am, the second airing flagged new. Trucking Hell returns at 9:15am (series 5, episode 7): a tanker swallowed whole by a sinkhole in the middle of Wokingham, and a BMW flipped into a ditch beside a Leicestershire country road. Police Interceptors follows at 10:15am (series 2, episode 5), officers hunting down a motorbike rider driving out of control, plus a petrol thief trying to torch his stolen haul. Gunsmoke takes 11:15am (series 12, episode 29), a man tasked with pulling nitroglycerin out of sticks of dynamite for a gang of safecrackers starting to lose his nerve as the process gets more dangerous.

Two westerns fill early afternoon, each split either side of a news bulletin. Lawman (1971), with Burt Lancaster, runs from 12:20pm and picks up again at 1:25pm: a lawman from Bannock rides into Sabbath to arrest every cattleman involved in a celebration that turned fatal the year before. The Tall T (1957), starring Randolph Scott and Richard Boone, follows the same pattern from 2:25pm and 3:30pm, a rancher and a pair of newlyweds held for ransom by outlaws in a tense standoff.

Highway Thru Hell opens the evening run at 4pm (series 1, episode 4), new driver Rob proving a slow learner and going AWOL mid-blizzard, testing Jamie’s patience to breaking point. Motorway Cops: Catching Britain’s Speeders follows at 5pm (series 3, episode 5), PC Niaz Waddington working undercover in an unmarked car to run down a vehicle on cloned plates along the M56.

5Action tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the 5Action primetime line-up for tonight, Thursday 13 August 2026.

Police Interceptors — 5Action, 6pm & 7pm

Two episodes open the night back to back. At 6pm, Interceptor Martin catches a driver doing well over 100mph and gets nothing but lip once the cuffs are on. The 7pm follow-up (series 15, episode 6) turns tenser: a drunk driver whose girlfriend has just been driven off tries it on with Interceptor Sophie, who shuts him down fast.

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

The cop-show run breaks for Motorway Cops at 8pm (series 3, episode 10). PC Cosgrove is called to a multi-vehicle pile-up in Warrington town centre, while officers elsewhere in Cheshire chase down a car reported stolen on the M6.

Police Interceptors — 5Action, 9pm

Police Interceptors returns at 9pm for a third and final outing tonight, this one from series 20. A shopkeeper reports three teenagers threatening him with a gun, and armed officers flood the area before Paul and Lewis spot a trio matching the description.

Timber Titans — 5Action, 10pm

A new episode of Timber Titans lands at 10pm (series 1, episode 6). The single-stem logging crew face steep ground and race up some of the tallest conifers in British Columbia’s backcountry.

The X-Files — 5Action, 11pm

The night ends with a series five rerun of The X-Files at 11pm. Mulder goes undercover inside an armed militia group holding a deadly pathogen.

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 and 5Action seems to know it, since it tends to get a decent 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?

The channel’s usual cop-show rotation. Police Interceptors takes 6pm and 7pm, Motorway Cops: Catching Britain’s Speeders breaks up the run at 8pm, a third Police Interceptors follows at 9pm, a new episode of Timber Titans airs at 10pm, and The X-Files closes the night 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’s pick is the 4pm Highway Thru Hell (series 1, episode 4): new recruit Rob turns out to be a slow learner and then disappears mid-blizzard, right when Jamie can least afford it, ahead of the evening’s cop-show run.

After that it’s three hours of Police Interceptors and Motorway Cops, which is either exactly what you came for or a reason to look elsewhere. The new Timber Titans is the only thing on the channel tonight that hasn’t aired before.

Related: Channel 5 TV Guide | Freeview Channel Guide | Films on TV This Week