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Television stations are now in the process of converting from analogFor the Analog Science Fiction and Science Fact publication, see Astounding Magazine. For the server log file analyzer, see Analog (program). An analog (American English spelling) or analogue (British English spelling) signal is any continuously variableue ( NTSCNTSC is the analog television system in use in the United States and many other countries, including most of the Americas and some parts of East Asia. It is named for the National Television System(s) Committee the industry-wide standardization body that, PALFor other meanings of "PAL" see PAL (disambiguation). PAL short for Phase Alternating Line Phase Alternation by Line or for Phase Alternation Line is a colour encoding used in broadcast television systems, used throughout the world except in most of the A, or SECAMSECAM Sequentiel Couleur avec Memoire French for "sequential color with memory") is an analog color television system first used in France. SECAM has been invented by a team lead by Henri de France and working at Thomson. It is historically the first Euro) to digitalA digital system is one that uses discrete values rather than a continuous spectrum of values: compare analog. The word comes from the same source as the word digit: the Latin word for finger (counting on the fingers) as these are used for discrete counti ( ATSC or DVBDVB short for Digital Video Broadcasting is a suite of internationally accepted, open standards for digital television maintained by the DVB Project an industry consortium with more than 300 members, and published by an Joined Technical Committee (JTC) of). In some countries, this is being forced on consumers and stations, while in others it is entirely voluntary.

The term television channel has become synonymous with "TV station" and even television network, leading to confusion. Television stations, in the United States, usually just have one transmitter, but are also generally associated with a nationwide television network, through which they get significant amounts of programming. Because some regions have had difficulty picking up over-the- air signals (particularly in mountainous areas), satellite and cable television has been introduced. Television channels specifically built to run on cable or satellite blur the line between TV station and TV network. That fact led some early cable networks to call themselves superstation s.

In the United States, each nationwide terrestrial broadcast network can have a few "O & O's", stations it owns and operates, usually in the larger broadcast market s. Satellite and cable have created changes. Broadcast stations in an area can sign up to be carried on cable (called " must-carry" in the U.S.), but content providers like TLC Network can too. They aren't licensed to run broadcast equipment like a station and they don't regularly provide content to licensed broadcasters either. Furthermore, a distributor like TNT may begin producing its own programming, and shows presented exclusively on cable by one distributor may be syndicated to broadcast stations.

A person viewing by cable or satellite may not know what kind of organization is responsible for the program, especially if it is syndicated, so what seems to be a station or a network may be neither.

See lists of television channels, for lists by country and language.