Television was first introduced in 1955 in Estonia, following the decision of Soviet government to setup a television station in 1953. The National TV Channel ETV has sustained an archive in which broadcasts of unique aspects of culture of Estonia are held, since 1955.
Television signals from Finland are received by Northern Estonia. Finnish broadcasts were more popular than Soviet Estonian offerings until the Singing Revolution during the 1970s and 1980s.
Digital television was officially started on 15 Dec, 2006, when the operator Eesti Digitaaltelevisiooni AS began its pay service ZUUMty. ETV was available for free until 2006 but as of March 2009, there are 7 free channels in digital broadcast. Levira broadcasts digital television signal, DVB-H and DVB-T. DVB-C is offered by cable operators named Starman, Telset, STV, telecommunications company Elion. On July, 2010, analog transmitters were switched off.
TV3 is a commercial television channel focused on Estonian language audience. Viasat (MTG) owns TV3 that was founded in 1996, after two latest television stations, EVTV and RTV merged together.
TV 3 has two sister channels. 3+ is a television channel that is focused on Russian language people in Estonia.
TV6 was launched as a digital sister channel to TV3 in 2008 and is mainly an entertainment television channel. The live streaming TV is also available throughout the country.
For a few years, TV3 had been receiving better ratings and reviews than other private channel named Kanal 2. The entire situation altered in the year 2006, when Kanal 2 introduced some big improvements in their programme. TV3 ratings fell and the programs had issues attracting enough viewers to attain the Top 10 of the week. The programme director Jüri Pihel also left TV3 later that year.
Some of the top shows and series currently aired on television are:-
• Kolmeraudne
• Elu keset linna
• Kaua võib
• Heimari kokaklubi
• Faktuaalne kaamera
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