Bell Media rebrands several Discovery channels, offering nationwide free preview

Bell Media announced it will rebrand several Discovery channels, with many gaining CTV branding.

According to press releases from the company, Animal Planet, Discovery Science, Discovery Velocity, Investigation Discovery, and the Discovery Channel itself will all be rebranded starting January 1st.

Animal Planet will become CTV Wild, Discovery Science will become CTV Nature, Discovery Velocity will become CTV Speed, Investigation Discovery will become Oxygen True Crime, and the Discovery Channel will become the USA Network.

Bell Media will move away from the Discovery branding and lean more into the CTV naming strategy that started in 2019 with the rebrand of three pre-existing channels into CTV Comedy, CTV Life, and CTV Space.

CTV Wild will focus on the animal side of nature programming, featuring shows like Cold Water Cowboys, Yellowstone Wardens, Wardens of the North, as well as an all new series named My Pet Ate What?!

CTV Nature will feature shows like fan favourite How it’s Made, Aussie Gold Hunters, Battlebots, and I Survived Bear Grylls.

CTV Speed will keep Velocity’s programming with shows like Last Stop Garage, Tougher Than it Looks, and Monster Garage.

Oxygen True Crime will come to Canada for the first time as part of a deal with NBC Universal that also brings USA Network to Canada.

USA Network will keep most of its programming and add new shows from the licensing deal. Two big additions to the network are AEW Collision and the NASCAR XFINITY Series.

Bell Media will offer a nationwide free preview of the new networks from January 1st to February 28th.

Bell Media isn’t the first network to rebrand some of its assets in the new year, as Corus Entertainment will rename Food Network Canada and HGTV Canada into the Home and Flavour networks due to the loss of the HGTV and Food Network naming rights.

For now, networks like TSN and CP24 will remain unchanged.

Source: Bell, (2), (3)