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

CBBC is the BBC’s channel for children roughly aged 6 to 12, on air every day from 7am until close around 7pm on Freeview 201. No adverts, on any platform, because the TV Licence pays for it. Today is Saturday 29 August 2026, and the schedule runs its usual full length through the summer holidays.

CBBC Schedule: Saturday 29 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete CBBC schedule for Saturday 29 August 2026, on Freeview 201.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

What’s on CBBC today

Saturday’s line-up opens at 7am with Shaun the Sheep, then Danger Mouse, Dennis & Gnasher Unleashed! and Boy Girl Dog Cat Mouse Cheese carry the schedule to Newsround’s regular 7:45am slot. A second Shaun the Sheep short, the Championsheeps spin-off, follows at 7:50am ahead of SpongeBob SquarePants, and Grizzy and the Lemmings: World Tour gets its only outing of the day at 8:10am. Duck and Frog doubles up either side of 8:20am before Counterfeit Cat and a new episode of The Amazing World of Gumball close out the hour. Teen Titans Go! opens the 9am slot, then the feature-length Scooby-Doo and the Legend of the Vampire runs through to 10:15am, when Kung Fu Panda: Secrets of the Furious Five takes over. Super Happy Magic Forest and a second Teen Titans Go! carry the schedule past 10:40am, and Blue Peter Challenges, The Next Step and Jamie Johnson FC take it up to midday.

The afternoon opens with Deadly 60 at 12pm, then Bro’s in Control and a doubled-up Odd Squad run through to 1pm. The Next Step and Malory Towers follow, before Danger Mouse repeats three times from 1:55pm and Boy Girl Dog Cat Mouse Cheese does the same from 2:35pm. Duck and Frog runs three episodes from 3:10pm and Super Happy Magic Forest does likewise from 3:35pm, before Dennis & Gnasher Unleashed!, Horrible Histories and Horrible Science close out the afternoon. CBBC’s evening is a short one: The Lady Grace Mysteries at 5:20pm, series two of A Kind of Spark at 5:45pm, and the second series of Crookhaven at 6:10pm, before a brief Phoenix Rise trailer and closedown at 6:58pm.

CBBC tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

CBBC’s evening is over almost as soon as it starts. Here’s what fills it tonight, Saturday 29 August 2026.

A Kind of Spark — CBBC, 5:45pm

Series two of A Kind of Spark opens tonight. Adapted from Elle McNicoll’s novel, the drama follows an autistic girl campaigning for her Scottish village to properly remember the women once executed there as witches, told throughout in her own blunt, unfiltered voice. The new run keeps that narration while pushing the family into a fresh dispute, this time sparked by someone targeting them online.

Crookhaven — CBBC, 6:10pm

Crookhaven returns for a second series, opening on the first of eight episodes. The drama is built around a boarding school that trains gifted young pickpockets and steers their light-fingered talents toward putting things right instead of lining their own pockets. It remains the closest thing CBBC has to a flagship drama, backed by a run of tie-in novels for anyone who wants more of the story between episodes.

A three-minute trailer for the new series of Phoenix Rise fills 6:55pm, and CBBC closes down two minutes later at 6:58pm with its familiar card announcing programmes resume at 7am.

What kind of shows are on CBBC

Drama

Crookhaven is the newest of CBBC’s dramas and the most ambitious: a boarding school that trains pickpockets to use the skill for good, back for a second run with a book range to go with it. Jamie Johnson FC, the football drama, is four series deep. Those two and Malory Towers give older viewers the thing most of the schedule can’t, which is characters and storylines that carry from one week to the next.

Comedy and animation

Most of the daytime is short-form comedy and animation. Danger Mouse and Dennis & Gnasher Unleashed! keep the old British characters ticking over, SpongeBob SquarePants and Teen Titans Go! cover the American imports, and newer originals like Boy Girl Dog Cat Mouse Cheese and Duck and Frog fill the ten- and fifteen-minute gaps between them. The one worth actually sitting down for is Odd Squad, a live-action comedy about child agents who solve their cases with maths.

Factual and entertainment

Horrible Science, Operation Ouch!, Gladiators: Epic Pranks and Deadly Dinosaurs with Steve Backshall keep CBBC’s factual slots closer to sketch comedy or a game show than a documentary.

News and long-running strands

Newsround goes out every morning, weekends included, and it is still proper news explained without talking down. Blue Peter is the channel’s other fixture: into its seventh decade, having changed presenters dozens of times and almost nothing else.

How to watch CBBC

Channel numbers

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

CBBC is free on all of the above platforms, with no subscription required.

Streaming online

CBBC streams live and free on BBC iPlayer at bbc.co.uk/iplayer, and via the iPlayer app on smart TVs, phones, tablets, Amazon Fire TV, Roku and most streaming sticks. You’ll need a free BBC account, which costs nothing to set up. Most CBBC programmes also stay available on demand for at least 30 days after broadcast, so a missed episode of Crookhaven or Blue Peter is rarely gone for good. A valid TV Licence is required to watch live or to stream a programme on the day it airs.

CBBC and CBeebies

CBeebies is the sister channel for the under-6s, on Freeview channel 202 from around 6am to 7pm. Shorter programmes, slower pace, nothing that has to be followed week to week. The switch across usually happens when talking animals stop cutting it and teen drama is still a way off, which is more or less the gap CBBC was built to sit in. See our CBeebies TV guide for that channel’s full schedule.

Frequently asked questions

What’s on CBBC today?

CBBC’s Saturday 29 August 2026 schedule runs at full length through the school summer holidays, opening with Shaun the Sheep at 7am and running through The Amazing World of Gumball, Deadly 60 and a run of afternoon regulars including Malory Towers, Odd Squad and Horrible Science. The evening is a short one: The Lady Grace Mysteries at 5:20pm, series two of A Kind of Spark at 5:45pm, and the second series of Crookhaven at 6:10pm, before a three-minute Phoenix Rise trailer and closedown at 6:58pm. Full times are in the schedule table above.

What time does CBBC start and finish each day?

CBBC broadcasts from 7am to 7pm every day, then hands its frequency to BBC Three until 7am the next morning.

Is CBBC free to watch, and does it carry adverts?

Yes, CBBC has no adverts on any platform. It’s funded by the TV Licence rather than advertising, though a valid TV Licence is required to watch it live or on the day of broadcast via iPlayer.

Can I watch CBBC on BBC iPlayer?

Yes. CBBC streams live on BBC iPlayer and most programmes stay available on demand for at least 30 days afterwards. You’ll need a free BBC account and a valid TV Licence to watch live or same-day content.

What’s the difference between CBBC and CBeebies?

CBBC is for roughly 6-to-12-year-olds and includes longer dramas, competitive formats and Newsround. CBeebies is aimed at under-6s, with shorter, gentler programmes and a calmer pace.

Verdict

The pitch for a parent is simple enough. Twelve hours a day you don’t have to vet first, and no autoplay quietly nudging a seven-year-old towards something you’d rather they hadn’t found.

It won’t compete with CBeebies for calm, or with streaming for anything aimed at teenagers, and it isn’t trying to. What it offers is Newsround done properly, and a schedule either side of it that doesn’t need a parent hovering.

Related: What’s On TV Tonight | CBeebies TV Guide | Films on TV This Week