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

Published: 26 August 2026

Dave is UKTV’s comedy and entertainment channel, and almost everything it broadcasts belongs to somebody else. The exception is Red Dwarf, which Dave revived in 2009 with the original cast and has been trading on ever since. UKTV became a wholly owned subsidiary of BBC Studios in 2021 and renamed the channel U&Dave in July 2024, when it pushed the whole portfolio under a single “U” brand. Nobody calls it that. Tonight, Thursday 27 August 2026, a run of Rick Stein’s Fresh Food closes out the early evening before Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing repeats its daytime outing at 7pm, Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse working Devon’s River Exe for grilse. A Would I Lie To You? double follows at 7:40pm and 8:20pm, running series 10’s fifth and sixth episodes back to back, then the drama Hit Point takes the 9pm hour. Have I Got a Bit More News for You holds its regular 10pm slot, with Professor Hannah Fry in the chair this week, before Taskmaster closes out the evening at 11pm. Channel numbers are further down the page.

Dave Schedule: Thursday 27 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete Dave schedule for Thursday 27 August 2026, on Freeview 19.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on Dave today

Thursday’s overnight stretch opens with Mock the Week at midnight, followed by two more Would I Lie To You? repeats at 12:40am and 1:20am and a QI XL rerun at 2am. Richard Osman’s House of Games and a Parks and Recreation episode carry things to 4am, when teleshopping fills the gap until Top Gear returns at 7:25am.

Two Border Force: America’s Gatekeepers episodes take the back half of the morning, then Rick Stein’s Fresh Food opens a two-part breakfast pairing at 10:20am ahead of a Yukon Gold outing at 11:20am. Top Gear runs twice more through the early afternoon before Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing gets its first outing of the day at 2:20pm — the same River Exe episode that returns in primetime. Speed with Guy Martin: F1 Challenge and Hairy Bikers’ Best of British take the rest of the afternoon, then Rick Stein’s Fresh Food runs four times from 5pm: the 5pm and 5:35pm editions repeat the morning’s 10:20am and 10:50am episodes, while 6:05pm and 6:30pm bring two new ones, handing over directly to tonight’s primetime line-up.

Dave tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the Dave primetime line-up for tonight, Thursday 27 August 2026.

Rick Stein’s Fresh Food — Dave, 6:05pm & 6:30pm

Dave runs four Rick Stein’s Fresh Food episodes back to back from 5pm, and the last two spill into the 6pm hour. At 6:05pm Stein visits a Bristol scheme helping low-income families cook on a budget, then at 6:30pm he meets a former schoolteacher living entirely by Victorian methods. Both are new to the schedule; the earlier 5pm and 5:35pm pair had already aired that morning at 10:20am and 10:50am.

Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing — Dave, 7pm

Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse spend the episode chasing grilse on Devon’s River Exe, then head to the Somerset coast for some shore fishing near Bossington Beach. It’s the same episode Dave showed at 2:20pm this afternoon, not a new outing.

Would I Lie To You? — Dave, 7:40pm

Rob Brydon puts Kevin Bishop, Brian Blessed, Josh Widdicombe and Kate Williams through the format’s usual mix of true stories and convincing lies, David Mitchell and Lee Mack picking apart every claim. This is series 10’s fifth episode.

Would I Lie To You? — Dave, 8:20pm

A second helping follows straight after, moving on to series 10’s sixth episode. This time it’s Claudia Winkleman on the panel, alongside Jamie Laing, Tracy-Ann Oberman and Rhod Gilbert.

Hit Point — Dave, 9pm

The crime drama continues with its third episode: Hubble’s body turns up in a canal, and Leo, Carter and Dylan scramble to pin the killing on someone else while trying to offload a drug dealer. Pascal, meanwhile, is out for revenge.

Have I Got a Bit More News for You — Dave, 10pm

The extended edition keeps its regular Thursday 10pm slot, though the host’s chair rotates weekly — this time it’s mathematician and broadcaster Professor Hannah Fry asking the questions, with Carol Vorderman and Phil Wang as guests while Paul Merton and Ian Hislop hold down their usual team-captain seats.

Taskmaster — Dave, 11pm

Greg Davies hands out another round of odd tasks in an episode built around a wind-dried puffin. Sally Phillips gets tangled up with an amorous watercooler, while Aisling Bea wrestles a dish into a balloon.

What kind of shows are on Dave

Panel shows and comedy institutions

This is the channel’s whole personality. Would I Lie to You?, QI, 8 Out of 10 Cats, Mock the Week when it’s in rotation: two decades of British panel comedy, nearly all of it bought in from the BBC and Channel 4 rather than commissioned here. What Dave adds is the scheduling. Episodes come in blocks you can drop into at any point and leave whenever you like, which is a different way of watching television and, on a weeknight, not the worst one.

Sitcoms: archive and revivals

Red Dwarf is the one thing Dave can properly call its own. The channel brought it back in 2009, a decade after the BBC finished with it, and got Chris Barrie, Craig Charles, Danny John-Jules and Robert Llewellyn all to return. Not Going Out is the other long runner, still in production after more than fifteen years.

Factual entertainment and documentaries

A thinner strand of observational and scripted-reality shows fills the gaps: Highland Cops, Meet the Richardsons and similar, mostly parked in daytime. It’s ballast between the comedy blocks.

How to watch Dave

Channel numbers

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

Dave is free on all of the above platforms, with no subscription required. Channel numbers can vary slightly by region and set-top box, so your on-screen guide is the definitive source if these don’t match.

Streaming online

Dave streams live and on demand for free on U, UKTV’s streaming service, at u.co.uk and through the U app on smart TVs, iOS, Android and Amazon Fire TV. U was called UKTV Play until the 2024 rebrand. You need a free account, and there are ad breaks, the same ones you’d sit through on a TV set.

Dave ja vu and sister channels

Dave ja vu is the timeshift channel, running the main schedule an hour behind under a pun that has somehow survived since the 2000s. It’s on Freeview 74, and coverage is patchier than the main signal because it shares broadcast capacity with local TV services in parts of the country. Where reception is thin, the U app is the better fallback for anything you’ve missed.

The rest of the family: U&Drama, U&Yesterday and U&W free to air, with U&Gold, U&Alibi and U&Eden behind pay-TV. All of them sit in the same app.

Frequently asked questions

What channel is Dave on Freeview?

Dave is on Freeview channel 19, and Dave ja vu on 74.

What’s on Dave tonight?

Tonight, Thursday 27 August 2026, four Rick Stein’s Fresh Food episodes fill Dave’s early evening, with two of them landing in the 6pm hour. Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing repeats its 2:20pm outing at 7pm, then Would I Lie To You? doubles up at 7:40pm and 8:20pm with series 10’s fifth and sixth episodes back to back. The drama Hit Point holds the 9pm hour, Have I Got a Bit More News for You keeps its 10pm slot with Professor Hannah Fry hosting this week, and Taskmaster wraps up the night at 11pm.

Who hosts QI and Would I Lie to You??

QI is hosted by Sandi Toksvig, with Alan Davies the permanent panellist since 2003. Would I Lie to You? is hosted by Rob Brydon, with David Mitchell and Lee Mack as team captains since the show began in 2007.

Can I watch Dave online for free?

Yes, free on U at u.co.uk or in the U app. You’ll need an account, and it’s ad-supported.

Verdict

Thursday’s daytime is straightforward Dave: Border Force, a couple of Top Gear editions and an early pass at both Rick Stein’s Fresh Food and Gone Fishing before the evening’s proper billing. Nothing here duplicates by accident, which the schedule sometimes does elsewhere on the channel.

Primetime is more of a repeat evening than it first looks. Gone Fishing’s River Exe outing is the same one Dave showed at 2:20pm, not a new episode, though the Would I Lie To You? double at least keeps series 10 moving forward, running episodes five and six back to back across 7:40pm and 8:20pm. The evening’s real news is Hit Point taking the 9pm hour with a crime drama rather than QI XL, and Have I Got a Bit More News for You holding its regular 10pm slot with Professor Hannah Fry in the chair this week. Taskmaster closes things out reliably, as it generally does.

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