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. Sunday evening hands over to a western double bill, Charlton Heston’s Will Penny from 6:40pm and Clint Eastwood’s Joe Kidd from 9pm, each one split by a short Entertainment News on 5 update, before two fresh episodes of World’s Deadliest Weather: Caught on Camera close things out before midnight.

5Action Schedule: Sunday 16 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete 5Action schedule for Sunday 16 August 2026, on Freeview 33.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on 5Action today

The overnight run belongs to The X-Files, three episodes from series five back to back starting at 12:50am: a case built around a blind woman who may be seeing through a killer’s eyes, a mutilated body that draws in a family priest, and an undercover assignment inside an armed militia group. A Trucking Hell highlights episode follows at 3:40am, Entertainment News on 5 has a short slot at 3:55am, and teleshopping then covers the dead hours through to 7am.

Cruise TV with LoveitBookit holds both 7am and 8am, the second airing a new edition. Winter Road Rescue opens proper programming at 9am with its 29th episode of series five, followed by two Outback Truckers instalments: a Townsville driver hauling mixed freight across to Darwin, then a volatile bull-carrying job that turns into trouble alongside a family haul with a sting in its tail. From 11:30am, five Gunsmoke episodes carry the schedule to mid-afternoon, closing out series twelve (an identity-swap drifter, nuns pleading with a bank robber, a two-part job extracting nitroglycerine from dynamite) before series thirteen opens with Matt Dillon and Kitty Russell escorting an outlaw whose stagecoach is sabotaged en route to Dodge. Bend of the River, the 1952 James Stewart and Rock Hudson western about homesteaders’ stolen supplies, then takes the 4:50pm slot and continues after a 5:50pm news break, running up to the evening’s main westerns.

5Action tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the 5Action primetime line-up for tonight, Sunday 16 August 2026: a western double bill either side of the news, then a fresh run of a weather-disaster series to close.

Will Penny — 5Action, 6:40pm

Charlton Heston leads this 1968 western as an ageing, largely illiterate line rider whose usefulness on the range is starting to run out. Joan Hackett plays the woman he finds sheltering in his winter cabin with her young son, and the arrangement pulls him into conflict with a hostile rival outfit. It’s a quieter, more character-driven film than the genre norm, and Heston later named the role among his own favourites. Entertainment News on 5 breaks in at 7:45pm before the film picks up again at 7:50pm.

Joe Kidd — 5Action, 9pm

Clint Eastwood plays the title role, a former bounty hunter drawn into a New Mexico land dispute after a wealthy rancher, played by Robert Duvall, hires him to hunt down the leader of a Mexican-American community fighting eviction from land the rancher claims as his own. John Sturges directs a script from crime novelist Elmore Leonard, and Eastwood spends much of the film visibly unsure which side he actually wants to be on. A second Entertainment News on 5 bulletin splits the film at 10pm, with the second half resuming at 10:05pm.

World’s Deadliest Weather: Caught on Camera — 5Action, 10:50pm

Series six of the disaster-footage strand opens the night’s closing double bill, built from amateur and dashcam clips of extreme weather events around the world. The 10:50pm opener covers earthquake devastation, and the 11:50pm follow-up turns to wildfire and flood footage from opposite ends of Europe.

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?

A western double bill. Charlton Heston’s Will Penny (1968) opens the run at 6:40pm and Clint Eastwood’s Joe Kidd (1972) takes the 9pm slot, each film split by a short Entertainment News on 5 bulletin. Series six of World’s Deadliest Weather: Caught on Camera closes the night from 10:50pm. 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

Will Penny at 6:40pm is the pick of tonight’s double bill: an unusually downbeat, character-led western that Heston himself rated among his best work, and a step up from the more conventional shoot-em-outs 5Action usually runs.

Joe Kidd at 9pm is solid, competently made studio filmmaking with a script pedigree worth noting (Elmore Leonard), but it doesn’t linger the way Will Penny does. Series six of World’s Deadliest Weather: Caught on Camera closes out the night from 10:50pm, running through to just before midnight.

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