Exports map: Your guide to UK TV sales in 2018

As we begin 2019, it’s important to take stock of the numbers. The last reported TV export figures for the UK are from Pact, which shows that estimated total revenues for 2016/17 added up to £902m.

The US, Australia, France, Germany and the Nordics were the UK’s largest export markets (as shown above), followed by Western Europe, Canada, China, Italy and Central Europe.

Genres that made the most sales included entertainment (£44m), factual (£43m), kids (£38m) and drama (£16m).

The British Film Institute (BFI) also recently launched its 2018 interim figures on the impact of screen sector tax relief implemented by the UK government in 2013 across high-end TV, animation, films, kids’ TV and gaming.

The findings show that the combined spend on high-end TV and film production in the UK reached £3.1bn, the second-highest year on record following 2017’s record performance of £3.28bn.

High-end TV, which is defined as a drama or documentary with a per hour budget of £1m, pulled £794.5m in inward investment, down by 2% on 2017’s consolidated spend of £810.7m. The interim spend at this point last year was, however, £684m. An overall £1.2bn was spent on the production of qualifying high-end programming in 2018.

For high-end TV, growth in inward investment was largely due to global content providers such as Netflix and Amazon.

Source: Pact TV Exports Report 2016/17, BFI Screen Business report 2018