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

Published: 10 September 2026

Sky Arts is the UK’s only dedicated arts channel: live concerts, gallery and biography documentaries, its own painting competitions, and plenty of archive drama besides. It has been free-to-air since 17 September 2020, when it arrived on Freeview and Freesat alongside its existing Sky and Virgin Media carriage. There’s no subscription and no account needed to watch it.

Tonight, Friday 11 September 2026, is anthology drama into music documentary: two Tales Of The Unexpected repeats open at 6pm and 6:30pm, then two editions of Alfred Hitchcock Presents follow at 7pm and 7:30pm, before Guy Garvey: From The Vaults takes the 8pm hour. Billy Joel: And So It Goes follows at 9pm, and Simon & Garfunkel: Old Friends Live on Stage closes out the night at 11:50pm. Full breakdown below.

Sky Arts Schedule: Friday 11 September 2026 (Full Listings)

Here is the complete Sky Arts schedule for Friday 11 September 2026, on Freeview 11.

Overnight

Breakfast

Morning

Afternoon

Early evening

Primetime

Late night

What’s on Sky Arts today

Overnight runs Alan J Pakula: The Directors from midnight, then Douglas Adams: The Man Who Imagined Our Future and Wuthering Heights: Love, Hate and Vengeance carry the schedule towards National Trust: National Treasures. Painting Birds With Jim And Nancy Moir opens at 5am, and the two-hour Andre Rieu concert film I Lost My Heart In Heidelberg fills 6am to 8am, ahead of two editions of The Joy Of Painting.

Two Tales Of The Unexpected episodes and two of Alfred Hitchcock Presents run through mid-morning, then Discovering: Michael Caine and Nirvana: Classic Albums take late morning and midday. Two more Tales Of The Unexpected episodes, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, Painting Birds With Jim And Nancy Moir and Discovering: Jean Simmons run through the afternoon. Portrait Artist Of The Year 2024 takes 5pm ahead of the evening below.

Sky Arts tonight — primetime and the evening schedule

Here’s the Sky Arts primetime line-up for tonight, Friday 11 September 2026.

Tales Of The Unexpected — Sky Arts, 6pm & 6:30pm

Two archive episodes from the anthology’s fifth series (series 5, episodes 6 and 7). In the first, two amateur burglars bring in a professional to help with a job that doesn’t go the way anyone plans, with Harry H Corbett and Fulton Mackay among the cast; in the second, a police officer is used as bait to draw out a murderer, starring Susan Penhaligon and Tim Woodward.

Alfred Hitchcock Presents — Sky Arts, 7pm & 7:30pm

Two half-hour instalments from the first series (episodes 26 and 27). The earlier story follows a writer, recently dead, granted the chance to relive his final day and work out who killed him; the later one centres on a man who takes on dangerous work to cover his wife’s medical bills, only for a blackmailer to complicate matters further.

Guy Garvey: From The Vaults — Sky Arts, 8pm

Elbow’s frontman digs into the archive for a 1978 selection, with performances from Ian Dury, the Boomtown Rats, the Jam and Kate Bush among those included (series 2, episode 4).

Billy Joel: And So It Goes — Sky Arts, 9pm

The first instalment of a two-part look back at his career, drawing on interview footage, concert clips, family films and old photographs (series 1, episode 1).

Simon & Garfunkel: Old Friends Live on Stage — Sky Arts, 11:50pm

A recording of the duo’s 2003 reunion concert at Madison Square Garden, with several guest performers joining them on stage.

What kind of shows are on Sky Arts

Live concerts and music documentaries

Concerts get the money and the camera crews, from arena nights with Andre Rieu down to something as small as Nicola Benedetti & Friends. Classic Albums goes through a record’s studio history track by track, usually with someone who was there at the mixing desk soloing the parts. The Discovering strand does the same job for careers rather than records.

Its own arts competitions

Portrait Artist of the Year and Landscape Artist of the Year are the channel’s best-known commissions: amateur and professional painters working against the clock on a real sitter or a real view, judged by a rotating panel that has included Kate Bryan, Kathleen Soriano and Tai-Shan Schierenberg, with Stephen Mangan hosting. The jeopardy is real because the deadline is real, which is more than most competition formats can say. Watercolour Challenge, now running as an archive repeat, is the lighter version: three amateurs, one scene, four hours.

Archive drama and classic film

The two Hitchcock strands and Tales of the Unexpected are anthology drama, built on twist endings rather than continuing storylines, which is exactly why they survive being shown out of order at half past one on a midweek afternoon. The Movies puts short introductions in front of older features so daytime viewers get some context first.

How to watch Sky Arts

Channel numbers

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

Virgin Media, Sky and Freely channel numbers can vary slightly by region and box, so your on-screen guide is the definitive source if these don’t match.

Streaming online

There’s no free standalone web player for Sky Arts in the way some other free-to-air channels offer one. Existing Sky TV customers can stream it through the Sky Go app at no extra cost, while anyone can add a NOW Entertainment Membership to watch Sky Arts live plus its substantial on-demand library, though that membership carries its own monthly cost.

Sky Arts streaming and catch-up

The linear schedule is the catch-up service. Sky Arts repeats its concert specials and music documentaries often, usually around an anniversary or whenever an artist is back in the news, so a missed broadcast tends to come round again within a few months. Worth checking the listings rather than assuming it has gone.

Frequently asked questions

What channel is Sky Arts on Freeview?

Sky Arts is on Freeview channel 11, with no subscription or account needed to watch it.

Is Sky Arts free to watch?

Yes. It’s been free-to-air since 17 September 2020, when it launched on Freeview and Freesat. There’s advertising during programmes, but no fee to watch the live channel on any platform.

What’s on Sky Arts tonight?

Tales Of The Unexpected runs a double bill at 6pm and 6:30pm, then Alfred Hitchcock Presents follows with two more episodes at 7pm and 7:30pm. Guy Garvey: From The Vaults takes the 8pm slot, Billy Joel: And So It Goes follows at 9pm, and Simon & Garfunkel: Old Friends Live on Stage closes the night at 11:50pm. Full times are in the schedule table above.

Can I watch Sky Arts online for free?

Only through an aerial, dish or existing Sky/Virgin box. There’s no free web stream for a phone or laptop. Existing Sky customers get Sky Go at no extra cost; everyone else would need a paid NOW Entertainment Membership for Sky Arts live plus its on-demand catalogue.

Verdict

Sky Arts earns its keep, mostly. Nothing else on free-to-air British television commissions arts programming at this scale, and the concert strand is the sort of thing a subscription service would happily charge for. The archive drama filling the daytime is comfortable rather than essential, and there is an awful lot of it.

Friday’s evening opens with the archive drama that fills so much of Sky Arts’ daytime too: two Tales Of The Unexpected episodes, then two of Alfred Hitchcock Presents. From 8pm it turns to music: Guy Garvey: From The Vaults, then Billy Joel: And So It Goes, before Simon & Garfunkel: Old Friends Live on Stage closes out the night. Standard practice for a channel filling twenty-four hours a day on a mix of its own documentary commissions and archive footage.

Related: BBC Four TV Guide | Freeview Channel Guide | Films on TV This Week