TV Guide UK Tonight: Wed 28 Oct 2026 – Budget Day, Liverpool v Chelsea & Celebrity Race Across the World

Updated: 28 October 2026

What’s on TV tonight, Wednesday 28 October 2026: the big free-to-air draw is Liverpool v Chelsea in the Carabao Cup on ITV1, with coverage from 7.30pm and kick-off at 8pm. EastEnders is on BBC One at 7.30pm, Celebrity Race Across the World follows at 8pm, and First Dates is on Channel 4 at 10pm. It’s also Budget day, so ITV1 and BBC Two are live from lunchtime, and Channel 4 News has an hour-long special at 7pm.

Quick Picks: Tonight’s Best

• Carabao Cup: Liverpool v Chelsea ITV1, from 7.30pm (k/o 8pm). Free to watch.
• EastEnders BBC One, 7.30pm. A funeral episode.
• Celebrity Race Across the World BBC One, 8pm. Borneo to Melbourne, no phones.
• Murder in Belfast: Sisters Seeking Justice BBC Two, 9pm. Both parts on iPlayer.
• First Dates Channel 4, 10pm.

Watch: What’s On TV Tonight

Budget Day

ITV News Special: The Chancellor’s Budget – ITV1, 12.15pm

ITV1’s Budget special starts at 12.15pm and runs to 1.50pm, which should catch the Chancellor’s statement live. It’s John Healey’s first Budget in the job. Nobody had confirmed a time for the speech when we wrote this, so assume lunchtime.

Politics Live: Budget 2026 – BBC Two, 12.30pm

Politics Live: Budget 2026 is on BBC Two from 12.30pm to 3.30pm, the longest run of coverage anywhere, so there’s room for reaction once the statement is over. BBC One sticks to its usual daytime schedule, with BBC News at One at 1pm and News at Ten at 10pm.

Budget Special: Channel 4 News – Channel 4, 7pm

Channel 4 News has an hour on Channel 4 at 7pm for a Budget special. If you’d rather have the verdict than sit through the speech, this is the one.

Early Evening

House of Games – BBC Two, 6pm

House of Games is on BBC Two at 6pm with Les Dennis, Jenny Eclair, Owain Wyn Evans and Lauren Patel. Strictly: It Takes Two follows at 6.30pm with the Halloween dances.

Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing – BBC Two, 7pm

Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing is on BBC Two at 7pm. Bob and Paul make one last trip to the Ribble with their dog Ted, who died not long after filming. Have tissues nearby.

The Future with Hannah Fry – BBC Two, 7.30pm

The Future with Hannah Fry is on BBC Two at 7.30pm: 25 minutes on what artificial intelligence could do for us and where it could go wrong, up to and including machines that outthink us. Fry is good at keeping this sort of subject calm. The full series is on iPlayer.

EastEnders – BBC One, 7.30pm

EastEnders is on BBC One at 7.30pm. Zoe Slater’s mother is buried tonight and Kat is grieving. The murder mystery rumbles on in the background too, with Cindy Beale looking like a possible suspect. It’s on iPlayer afterwards, and if you want a soap double, Hollyoaks is on E4 at 7pm.

Prime Time

Carabao Cup: Liverpool v Chelsea – ITV1, 7.30pm ⭐

Liverpool v Chelsea is live on ITV1 and ITVX from 7.30pm, with kick-off at 8pm at Anfield. It’s a fourth-round Carabao Cup tie with Mark Pougatch presenting, and the first League Cup meeting between the two since the 2024 final. For once you don’t need Sky to watch a game this size.

Cup nights at Anfield tend to be loud and a bit chaotic. Both clubs have big squads, so expect rotation rather than the usual line-ups. Sky Sports Main Event shows it too, from 7pm. There’s no extra time at this stage of the competition: a draw goes straight to penalties, which can push the rest of ITV1’s evening back a few minutes.

Celebrity Race Across the World – BBC One, 8pm

Celebrity Race Across the World is on BBC One at 8pm. The pairs start in Kuching, Borneo, and have to get to Melbourne without phones, cards or flights. Sam Ryder is travelling with his tour manager Kaz Coles, Jeff Stelling with his son Matt, Princess and Junior Andre as brother and sister, and Ella Eyre with her friend Nana Pepera. They’re still on the first leg, so most of the bad decisions are ahead of them.

Location, Location, Location – Channel 4, 8pm

Location, Location, Location is on Channel 4 at 8pm, with Kirstie Allsopp and Phil Spencer going back to two earlier property hunts. Revisits are the best version of this show, because you find out whether anyone bought the house they swore they loved.

How the Romans Conquered the Alps – BBC Four, 8pm

How the Romans Conquered the Alps is on BBC Four at 8pm. It covers Augustus pushing into the mountains in 15 BC, and what marching with a legionary’s 30kg of kit was actually like.

Portrait Artist of the Year – Sky Arts, 8pm

Portrait Artist of the Year is on Sky Arts at 8pm, with Stephen Mangan hosting and Danny Beard, Yalda Hakim and Arti Shah sitting this week. Half the fun is watching the artists cope with a sitter who won’t stop talking.

Miss Scarlet – Drama, 8pm

Miss Scarlet is on Drama at 8pm. Eliza Scarlet has to pick between a newspaper job and working with Scotland Yard, with a killer still at large. U has the full series.

Shakespeare & Hathaway: Private Investigators – Alibi, 8pm

Shakespeare & Hathaway: Private Investigators is on Alibi at 8pm. This week’s case is on a cursed film set, which gives the cast an excuse for an hour of old sci-fi B-movie pastiche. Daft, and it knows it. Catch up on NOW.

Who Do You Think You Are? – BBC One, 9pm

Who Do You Think You Are? is on BBC One at 9pm with Ruth Jones, whose search takes in a paternal grandfather connected to the Medical Aid Societies in South Wales. The Gavin & Stacey co-creator makes an easy guest, and Welsh local history suits her.

Murder in Belfast: Sisters Seeking Justice – BBC Two, 9pm

Murder in Belfast: Sisters Seeking Justice is on BBC Two at 9pm. Robert McCartney was killed outside a Belfast pub in January 2005, and this follows his five sisters through their long fight for justice. Hard going, and worth it.

Both parts are already on iPlayer if you’d rather watch them back to back.

Grand Designs – Channel 4, 9pm

Grand Designs is on Channel 4 at 9pm: a couple converting a 150-year-old barn on a £420,000 budget. You already know how a £420,000 budget on a barn goes.

All Of Us Strangers – Film4, 9pm

All Of Us Strangers (2023) is on Film4 at 9pm, with Andrew Scott and Paul Mescal. It’s a quiet, sad ghost story, and we’d put it among the best British films of the last few years. Films on TV tonight has the rest of the evening’s films.

Our Tiny Islands – More4, 9pm

Our Tiny Islands is on More4 at 9pm, calling at Alderney, Lundy, Papa Westray and Caldey.

Rob and Romesh vs the Supernatural in New Orleans – Sky One, 9pm

Rob Beckett and Romesh Ranganathan go ghost-hunting in New Orleans on Sky One at 9pm. Romesh plays the sceptic and Rob scares easily. That’s the whole joke, and it mostly works. Catch up on NOW.

Universal Soldier – ITV4, 9.30pm

Universal Soldier is on ITV4 at 9.30pm, the 1992 action film with Jean-Claude Van Damme and Dolph Lundgren. Silly and violent, as intended.

Late Night

First Dates – Channel 4, 10pm

First Dates is on Channel 4 at 10pm, with Fred Sirieix and Merlin Griffiths running the restaurant. Tonight’s diners include a TikTok star, a footballer, a Traitors favourite and a glamorous great-grandmother.

Ellie & Natasia – BBC Two, 10pm

Ellie & Natasia starts on BBC Two at 10pm, a surreal sketch show from Ellie White and Natasia Demetriou with Asim Chaudhry in the cast. Expect a snake-themed game show and a very odd driving lesson. The whole series is on iPlayer, and Newsnight follows at 10.30pm.

The Monkey – BBC One, 10.40pm

The Monkey is on BBC One at 10.40pm, a 2025 horror comedy led by Theo James, with Tatiana Maslany alongside him. Twin brothers are stuck with a cursed toy monkey, and people around it keep dying. Right on time for Halloween week.

On the rest of the dial, ITV2 has The 1% Club at 8pm and Big Brother at 9pm, ITV3 has Midsomer Murders at 8pm, Channel 5 has Cause of Death at 9pm and E4 repeats Gogglebox at 10pm. Dave has QI XL at 9pm, Legend has the Stallone film Driven at 9pm, and 5USA runs three NCIS back to back from 6pm. Yesterday has Guy Martin: Proper Jobs at 9pm and Talking Pictures TV has The Boston Strangler at 9.05pm.

Sport

Away from Anfield, Hearts v Rangers is on Sky Sports Football at 7pm, kick-off 8pm. TNT Sports 1 has two Serie A games, AC Milan v Bologna from 5.30pm and Monza v Napoli from 7.45pm, then game five of the World Series at midnight. Day two of South Africa v Australia in Cape Town is on Sky Sports from 8am. ITV4 has rugby highlights at 6.50pm and Carabao Cup highlights at midnight. Sport on TV today has the full list.

What’s On Streaming

BBC iPlayer: EastEnders, Celebrity Race Across the World, The Future with Hannah Fry, Murder in Belfast (both parts), Ellie & Natasia (full series), How the Romans Conquered the Alps.

ITVX: Liverpool v Chelsea live, ITV News Special.

Channel 4 streaming: First Dates, Location, Location, Location, Grand Designs.

NOW: Rob and Romesh vs the Supernatural, Shakespeare & Hathaway.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is EastEnders on tonight (Wednesday 28 October 2026)?

Yes. EastEnders is on BBC One at 7.30pm tonight (Wednesday 28 October), and the funeral of Zoe Slater’s mother is the big event. It’s on iPlayer afterwards, and Celebrity Race Across the World follows at 8pm.

What time is the Budget on TV?

Chancellor John Healey delivers the Budget today (Wednesday 28 October), and no official start time had been confirmed when we wrote this. The statement traditionally comes around lunchtime, after Prime Minister’s Questions. ITV1 starts an ITV News special at 12.15pm and BBC Two has Politics Live from 12.30pm to 3.30pm. Channel 4 News has a Budget special at 7pm.

What time is Liverpool v Chelsea on TV tonight?

Liverpool v Chelsea in the Carabao Cup is on ITV1 and ITVX tonight, with coverage from 7.30pm and kick-off at 8pm at Anfield. Mark Pougatch presents. Sky Sports Main Event also has it, from 7pm.

What’s the best TV show on tonight (Wednesday 28 October 2026)?

Liverpool v Chelsea on ITV1 from 7.30pm is the biggest free-to-air draw. For something else, Celebrity Race Across the World is on BBC One at 8pm, and First Dates is on Channel 4 at 10pm.

What’s on ITV tonight?

ITV1 has The Chase at 5pm, then the football takes over: Liverpool v Chelsea in the Carabao Cup, with coverage from 7.30pm and kick-off at 8pm. Coronation Street and Emmerdale aren’t on ITV1 tonight (Wednesday 28 October), though ITV3 has classic Coronation Street at 4.40pm and 5.15pm. Earlier, ITV News has a Budget special from 12.15pm.

What live sport is on TV tonight: Wednesday 28 October 2026?

Liverpool v Chelsea in the Carabao Cup is live on ITV1 (coverage from 7.30pm, kick-off 8pm) and Sky Sports Main Event. Hearts v Rangers is on Sky Sports Football at 7pm with kick-off at 8pm. In cricket, day two of South Africa v Australia is on Sky Sports from 8am, and ITV4 has Carabao Cup highlights at midnight.

What’s on BBC One tonight?

BBC One has The One Show at 7pm, EastEnders at 7.30pm, Celebrity Race Across the World at 8pm and Who Do You Think You Are? with Ruth Jones at 9pm. The Monkey, a horror comedy, starts at 10.40pm.

What time is Celebrity Race Across the World on tonight?

Celebrity Race Across the World is on BBC One at 8pm tonight (Wednesday 28 October) and lasts an hour. Episodes are on iPlayer afterwards.

What channel is Rob and Romesh vs the Supernatural on?

Rob and Romesh vs the Supernatural in New Orleans is on Sky One at 9pm tonight (Wednesday 28 October). You can catch up on NOW.

What films are on TV tonight (Wednesday 28 October 2026)?

BBC One has The Monkey at 10.40pm. Film4 shows All Of Us Strangers at 9pm and The Innocents at 11.10pm, ITV4 has Universal Soldier at 9.30pm and Legend has Driven at 9pm.

Tonight by Channel

A channel-by-channel breakdown of Wednesday 28 October 2026, so you can jump straight to the one you actually watch.

BBC One

• 7.30pm — EastEnders
• 8pm — Celebrity Race Across the World
• 9pm — Who Do You Think You Are?
• 10.40pm — The Monkey

BBC Two

• 12.30pm — Politics Live: Budget 2026
• 6pm — House of Games
• 7pm — Mortimer & Whitehouse: Gone Fishing
• 7.30pm — The Future with Hannah Fry
• 9pm — Murder in Belfast: Sisters Seeking Justice
• 10pm — Ellie & Natasia

ITV1

• 7.30pm — Carabao Cup: Liverpool v Chelsea

Channel 4

• 7pm — Budget Special: Channel 4 News
• 8pm — Location, Location, Location
• 9pm — Grand Designs
• 10pm — First Dates

The Viewing Schedule

Tonight’s television listings for the main channels, in time order.

Final Verdict

If you only watch one thing tonight, make it Liverpool v Chelsea on ITV1. It’s free, and it’s a proper cup tie. Not a football person? Celebrity Race Across the World is the pick on BBC One at 8pm, and Murder in Belfast is the serious one on BBC Two.

Budget day means a lot of talking before teatime. First Dates at 10pm is the easiest way to switch off afterwards.