E4 TV Guide: Listings, Schedule & What’s On E4 Tonight

E4 is Channel 4’s younger-skewing entertainment channel: American sitcom reruns through the day, reality formats after dark, and the Hollyoaks first-look Monday to Wednesday at 7pm. There’s no Hollyoaks on E4 tonight, Thursday 20 August 2026 — the 7pm first-look slot only runs Monday to Wednesday, so tonight’s schedule hands the early evening entirely to The Simpsons, four episodes back to back from 6pm as part of a longer run that started at 5pm. The Great Celebrity Bake Off for Stand Up to Cancer takes the 8pm slot, followed by the brand new series Cruising Paradise: Above & Below Deck at 9pm, a single episode of Gogglebox at 10pm and First Dates closing the night at 11:05pm.

E4 Schedule: Thursday 20 August 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete E4 schedule for Thursday 20 August 2026, on Freeview 13.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on E4 today

Thursday’s overnight run opens with Naked Attraction just after midnight, then a Gogglebox repeat and Vanderpump Rules carry the small hours ahead of a solo Simpsons outing and a pair of Brooklyn Nine-Nine episodes just after 3am. The Goldbergs runs twice from 4:20am to close out the graveyard slot, handing over to Modern Family at 6am for two episodes ahead of Couples Come Dine with Me at 7am and a pair of Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares USA visits from 8am.

America’s Funniest Home Videos and a single Below Deck Mediterranean outing carry mid-morning, before the channel settles into its usual sitcom stacking for the rest of the day: four episodes of The Simpsons from midday, two of Brooklyn Nine-Nine from 2pm, four of Modern Family from 3pm, then The Simpsons takes over completely from 5pm — six episodes in a row running through to 8pm, four of them inside primetime. There is no Hollyoaks anywhere in today’s line-up; Thursday and Friday are the two weekdays the first-look slot sits out.

E4 tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the E4 primetime line-up for tonight, Thursday 20 August 2026. There is no Hollyoaks on the channel today — the first-look slot only runs Monday to Wednesday, and both of E4’s usual 7pm and 7:30pm Hollyoaks slots go to The Simpsons instead.

The Simpsons — E4, 6pm–7:30pm

E4 gives over the whole of early primetime to Homer and family. It’s the tail end of a six-episode run that started at 5pm: “Million Dollar Maybe” (6pm, series 21) has Homer trying to keep a lottery win secret from the rest of the family, “Boy Meets Curl” (6:30pm) sends the couple curling their way toward Olympic trials, “Fear of Flying” (7pm, series 6) gets Homer mistaken for an airline pilot, and “Homer the Great” (7:30pm) has him inducted into a secret society with a guest voice from Patrick Stewart.

The Great Celebrity Bake Off for Stand Up To Cancer — E4, 8pm

Four new faces take on the tent at 8pm: Suzi Ruffell, David O’Doherty, Gabby Logan and Oti Mabuse work through an ice cream roll challenge before a meringue showstopper built around each baker’s biggest fear (series 7, episode 3). Paul Hollywood and Prue Leith judge as usual, with proceeds going to Stand Up To Cancer.

Cruising Paradise: Above & Below Deck — E4, 9pm

A brand new series launches at 9pm, following the crew and guests aboard the Star Princess. Episode four covers a crew changeover and a shore excursion to Cozumel, where guests squeeze into small rented Scoot Coupes to see the island.

Gogglebox — E4, 10pm

Just one episode tonight rather than the usual double, with the regular cast reacting to recent telly including The 1% Club, Made in Chelsea and the local elections coverage on BBC News (series 21, episode 12).

First Dates — E4, 11:05pm

The night closes with three new pairings in the restaurant, including a cocktail mixer, a party girl and a dog groomer among those hoping for a second date (series 18, episode 5).

Popular shows on E4

Reality

Married at First Sight Australia is E4’s most-watched acquisition and the one that reorders the whole schedule when a series is on. Three or four episodes a week, strangers paired off by “experts”, married at first meeting, then sat at a dinner party until somebody says the unforgivable thing. The UK version plays much quieter. Its couples absorb the pressure rather than detonate at the table, which is more realistic and considerably less watchable.

Celebs Go Dating has been on E4 since 2016 and has never changed shape: two relationship coaches, currently Paul C. Brunson and Anna Williamson, a handful of celebrity clients, and dates with members of the public.

Gogglebox is a Friday-night Channel 4 show. E4 runs the repeats.

Soap

Hollyoaks has been on Channel 4 since 1995 and in E4’s first-look slot long enough that most viewers under 35 have never known it any other way. It takes on the heavy issue storylines soaps go in for, mental health and addiction and the rest, while keeping the pace quick and the cast young.

US comedy

The Big Bang Theory, Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Modern Family anchor daytime, and all three sit on Channel 4’s streaming service on demand. The Simpsons is the exception to everything. E4 holds so much of it that a single day can jump across two decades of the show without anyone at the channel appearing to mind.

How to watch E4

Channel numbers

Where to find E4 by platform:

E4 is free-to-air everywhere. A Freeview aerial carries it, and so does every Sky package as standard.

Streaming

E4 streams live and on demand for free through Channel 4’s app and channel4.com, covering smart TVs, iOS, Android, Amazon Fire TV, Roku and most streaming sticks. Registration is free and asks for no payment details. Adverts play regardless. The full E4 library is there as well, including complete runs of Married at First Sight Australia and MAFS UK, and Hollyoaks as catch-up after transmission.

E4 +1, E4 Extra and the Channel 4 family

E4 +1 on Freeview 30 is a straight one-hour timeshift, so 7pm here is 8pm there.

E4 Extra is the sister channel for repeats and extra runs of E4’s biggest shows. It launched in 2022 in the slot 4Music vacated, and sits on Freeview 31 and Sky 139.

Both sit in the wider Channel 4 family alongside the main channel, More4 for factual and Film4 for cinema. All of them are commercially funded. Channel 4 is publicly owned but takes no licence fee money and no government subsidy, a distinction worth remembering the next time somebody complains about the adverts.

Frequently asked questions

What’s on E4 tonight?

There’s no Hollyoaks tonight — Thursday is one of the two weekdays the first-look slot sits out, so The Simpsons fills both the 7pm and 7:30pm slots instead, part of a six-episode run that starts at 5pm. The Great Celebrity Bake Off for Stand Up to Cancer takes the 8pm slot, the new series Cruising Paradise: Above & Below Deck launches at 9pm, a single episode of Gogglebox airs at 10pm and First Dates closes out the night at 11:05pm. Times are in the schedule table above.

Does E4 have adverts?

Yes. It is a commercial channel, so ad breaks run on linear TV and on the streaming free tier alike. No licence fee, no subscription. Record it on a PVR and you can skip them as usual.

When did E4 launch?

E4 launched on 18 January 2001 as a companion to Channel 4, aimed at younger viewers from day one. It began as a subscription service, later went free-to-air, and reached Freeview in May 2005.

Verdict

Thursday breaks from E4’s usual weekday shape rather than following it. Hollyoaks is off entirely — no first-look episode, no repeat — because the slot only runs Monday to Wednesday. In its place, The Simpsons takes over the whole of early primetime, four episodes back to back from 6pm as part of a six-episode run that started an hour earlier.

The evening’s real business starts at 8pm, when The Great Celebrity Bake Off for Stand Up to Cancer sends a new set of famous faces into the tent: Suzi Ruffell, David O’Doherty, Gabby Logan and Oti Mabuse. An hour later, Cruising Paradise: Above & Below Deck launches as a genuinely new series rather than an extension of an existing one, following the Star Princess through a crew changeover and a stop in Cozumel. Gogglebox drops back to a single episode at 10pm instead of its usual double, and First Dates rounds off the night at 11:05pm.

Daytime keeps its familiar sitcom stacking — four Simpsons episodes at midday, Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Modern Family through the afternoon, then six more Simpsons episodes running from 5pm into primetime — with Ramsay’s Kitchen Nightmares USA, Naked Attraction and Vanderpump Rules covering breakfast and the small hours. The absence of Hollyoaks is the one thing that marks the day out from the rest of the week.

Related: What’s On TV Tonight | Channel 4 TV Guide | E4 Schedule | Films on TV This Week