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

5USA is Channel 5’s home for imported American crime and legal drama, the channel that keeps NCIS, Blue Bloods and the Law & Order franchise on British screens night after night. It launched as Five US in October 2006, took the 5USA name in 2011, and has sat inside the Paramount-owned Channel 5 family since 2014. Tonight, Tuesday 18 August 2026, three NCIS episodes carry the channel into the evening before a new episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit airs at 9pm, and two more Special Victims Unit episodes close out the night.

5USA Schedule: Tuesday 18 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete 5USA schedule for Tuesday 18 August 2026, on Freeview 21.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Primetime

Late night

What’s on 5USA today

Tuesday’s schedule opens overnight with a Law & Order: Special Victims Unit double bill running from midnight, then a single Blue Bloods episode and a Murder She Wrote rerun before Entertainment News on 5 and two hours of teleshopping carry things through to 6am. Ideal World Shopping fills the breakfast hour for three hours, then a fresh Entertainment News bulletin at 9am hands over to NCIS proper: three season one episodes run back to back from 9:10am. From midday, six Law & Order episodes take the schedule right through to 6pm, working through series six.

5USA tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the 5USA primetime line-up for tonight, Tuesday 18 August 2026.

NCIS — 5USA, 6pm–8pm

Three NCIS episodes run back to back into the evening (series 2, episodes 11 to 13), the usual warm-up before the night’s main event.

Law & Order: Special Victims Unit — 5USA, 9pm

The night’s headline slot goes to a new episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, series 26, episode 6. The case opens with a woman found badly hurt at a remote campground, the kind of cold-open shock the franchise still leans on two and a half decades in.

Law & Order: Special Victims Unit — 5USA, 10pm–11pm

Two more Special Victims Unit episodes close out the night (series 19, episodes 17 and 18), pulled from well back in the show’s run rather than continuing straight on from the 9pm premiere.

What kind of shows are on 5USA

NCIS and the naval procedural strand

NCIS is the spine of the schedule. Donald P. Bellisario’s naval investigative drama spun off from JAG in 2003 and has since piled up more than twenty seasons of case-of-the-week plotting, which 5USA works through steadily, usually a season or two behind the current US broadcast.

Law & Order and the Chicago-style franchise format

Dick Wolf’s Law & Order universe, headlined here by Special Victims Unit, is the other pillar. The channel likes to string two or three episodes together in one block, which works because the franchise was built on a rotating cast of detectives and prosecutors rather than a single running story. You can drop in anywhere.

Family and legal drama: Blue Bloods and Bull

Blue Bloods brings the one thing most of 5USA’s imports skip: a family at the centre of the case files, with the Reagans’ dinner-table scenes doing as much work as the investigations. Bull, Michael Weatherly’s post-NCIS drama about a trial-science consultancy, fills a similar afternoon role more lightly. CBS ended it in 2022 after six seasons.

TV movies, classic mystery and reruns

The gaps go to Jesse Stone TV films, Murder She Wrote reruns and reality strands like Cops. Nothing on 5USA is live.

How to watch 5USA

Channel numbers

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

Virgin Media and regional Sky channel numbers can shift slightly depending on your box and area, so your on-screen guide is the definitive source if these don’t match.

Streaming online

5USA streams live and free at channel5.com and via the 5 app (formerly My5) on smart TVs, iOS, Android, and Amazon Fire TV. You’ll need a free 5 account, which costs nothing to set up. Selected NCIS, Blue Bloods and Law & Order episodes also turn up on demand, though licensing means not everything broadcast makes it there and availability windows vary by title.

5USA +1 and sister channels

5USA +1 runs the same schedule an hour behind on Freeview and Freesat channel 130. If a show has already started on the main channel, it’s just beginning on 5USA +1.

The sister channels split the rest of Channel 5’s imports between them. 5Star takes US reality and lifestyle, 5Action takes films and adventure series, and 5Select, the newest of them, handles documentary and factual.

Frequently asked questions

What’s on 5USA tonight?

Three NCIS episodes lead into the evening from 6pm, running through series two, before a new episode of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit airs at 9pm. Two more Special Victims Unit episodes close out the night at 10pm and 11pm.

What time do the main shows start on 5USA?

Primetime on 5USA typically runs from around 7pm through to midnight, with the headline procedural slot usually landing at 9pm. Daytime hours are mostly given over to earlier seasons of the same shows, run in double or triple bills.

Is 5USA free to watch?

Yes, entirely free to air on Freeview, Sky, Virgin Media and Freesat. There are ad breaks throughout, as with any commercial channel, but no subscription fee anywhere.

Can I watch 5USA online for free?

Yes. It streams live at channel5.com and through the 5 app; you’ll need a free account. Selected episodes of its biggest shows also appear on demand afterwards, though not every episode makes the cut.

Verdict

Tuesday’s main event is the new Special Victims Unit episode at 9pm. Three NCIS episodes do the usual warm-up job, running back to back from 6pm without needing much comment, but giving series 26 a clear run at 9pm, rather than squeezing it in against older reruns, is 5USA treating it as the night’s genuine news.

The two further Special Victims Unit episodes that close the night from 10pm are pulled from much further back in the show’s history, exactly what regular viewers expect from that slot: familiar and undemanding. It’s the new episode at 9pm that makes this particular Tuesday worth flagging.

Related: What’s On TV Tonight | Channel 5 TV Guide | Freeview Channel Guide | Films on TV This Week