The Netherlands now has three major forms of broadcast digital television. Terrestrial (DVB-T), Cable (DVB-C), and Satellite (DVB-S). In addition IPTV services are available. At the end of the first quarter of 2013 almost 84% of the households in the Netherlands had some form of digital television.
Terrestrial
After tests held in 2002, digital terrestrial television in the Netherlands was launched on April 23, 2003 by Digitenne, the main Dutch digital television platform owned by KPN. The Netherlands was the second European country to complete the move to digital terrestrial broadcasting on December 11, 2006. The switch-off was helped greatly by the fact that about 90% of the households have cable that continues to use analog distribution. Due to the very extensive penetration of cable systems, usage of terrestrial television in the Netherlands is largely confined to remote rural areas and for portable televisions in caravans, etc.
Since then all terrestrial television broadcast in the Netherlands are digital. The national public television channels NPO 1, NPO 2, NPO 3 and the regional public television channels are free-to-air.
DVB-T2 transmissions in the Netherlands are provided commercially by KPN daughter company Digitenne. They offer 25 TV channels and 16 radio channels, including the free-to-air channels. The Digitenne service uses Conax encryption.
Handheld
KPN launched a DVB-H service MobileTV on Thursday, June 5, 2008 with a bouquet of ten channels. The ten channels are NPO 1, NPO 3, RTL 4, RTL 24, SBS 6, Disney XD (Netherlands)/Veronica, MTV, Discovery Channel, Xite and Nick Toons. RTL24 is a made-for-mobile channel with news and current affair. Xite is a new Dutch music channel. In November 2008, a new dedicated mobile TV channel was added. Nu.tv from Ilse Media and the nu.nl news web site. The service was closed on June 1, 2011, KPN is now using the freed up capacity for adding new channels to its Digitenne DTT platform.
Cable
Over 90% of the households in the Netherlands receive their television signal by cable, making it one of the highest cable penetrated countries. Some cable viewers still watch analogue because no set-top box is necessary. But with the uptake of LCD and plasma televisions customers are looking for better picture quality in digital cable. In addition digital cable offers hundreds of channels compared to the about thirty channels analogue cable offers.
All the major cable companies in the Netherlands offer a digital television service. They all use the DVB-C standard for their digital signal but use different encryption techniques, most used are Irdeto 2 and Nagravision. The largest cable company, Ziggo, supports the CI+ standard making it possible for their customers to use televisions with an integrated digital tuner without the need for an additional set-top-box. All cable companies offer a number of high-definition channels. The most watched channels are being transmitted in the clear on the Ziggo and Caiway digital cable networks.
The three largest cable companies in the Netherlands are: Ziggo Caiway DELTA
Satellite
Digital satellite television in the Netherlands is available via CanalDigitaal, using the SES' Astra satellites at 19.2° east and 23.5° east. Services from both satellite positions can be received using a single dish with a Duo LNB, specifically designed for this purpose.
It is only possible to register as a customer of CanalDigitaal using a Dutch postal address, due to copyright restrictions. A standard DVB-S receiver is used, which can also receive other free-to-air broadcasts. CanalDigitaal uses the Mediaguard/Nagravision encryption.
In 2017 a second provider of digital satellite television began its services named Joyne, using the Eutelsat's Eurobird satellites at 9° east. Joyne uses the Conax encryption.
IPTV
Since May 1, 2006 KPN offers Mine TV, an IPTV service based on their DSL service, with the ability to receive Video on demand and replay a missed TV episodes besides regular TV programming. During 2007, the KPN service was renamed KPN Interactieve TV.
Tele2 also offers an IPTV service called Tele2Vision. Since mid-2008 XMSNET also has started the rollout of IPTV over their FTTH (Fiber To The Home) network in several cities in the Netherlands.
High definition
In the Netherlands customers can receive high-definition television channels by cable or satellite and DVB-T2.