UK commercial network Channel 5 has reportedly landed a deal to show a daily highlights program covering this year’s Commonwealth Games in Glasgow, Scotland, via a sublicensing agreement with media giant Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD).
WBD holds exclusive live rights to the event in the UK, with the broadcaster planning to air more than 600 hours of live coverage during the event via a dedicated linear channel.
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According to The Guardian news outlet, WBD has agreed a sublicensing deal with Channel 5, ending the 72-year relationship between that event and the BBC, the UK's public-service broadcaster.
The BBC has aired every Commonwealth Games edition since 1954 but was outbid by WBD for rights to this year’s event last December.
Glasgow 2026 will take place between July 23 and August 2. The event will include only 10 sports and six para sports, with the games previously allocated to Victoria in Australia before financial issues forced the state to pull out, with the Scottish city stepping in last year.
In terms of recent commercial activity for the Commonwealth Games, the organizing committee added UK-based software company Ideagen as the event’s official AI technology principal partner as part of a wide-ranging agreement.
Other recent partners secured for Glasgow 2026 include Corporate and Sporting Events, the UK-based logistics solutions provider, and Chinese electric vehicle company BYD, comning in as the event's official car partner.
Glasgow is due to host the event for the second time, having previously done so in 2014.
The 2026 Commonwealth Games was originally set to be hosted by the Australian state of Victoria, but the region's government withdrew in July 2023 owing to a huge increase in the projected cost of staging the games – originally projected to hit A$2.6 billion ($1.7 billion), the cost then rose to an untenable A$6 billion.
Malaysia was briefly considered as a replacement before Glasgow stepped in.
In its withdrawal, Victoria had to pay A$380 million to the CGF as compensation, £100 million ($129 million) of which CGS has budgeted to use for the financing of its Commonwealth Games proposal, with the remaining £30-£50 million to be drawn from ticketing, sponsorship, and broadcast revenue.
Last October, meanwhile, the Indian city of Ahmedabad was announced as the replacement host for the 2030 Commonwealth Games after Alberta, Canada, also pulled out in mid-2023.
While Glasgow will host a scaled-down version of the games, with only a 10-sport program, Indian officials have already stated they will organize a full slate of events and use the games as a stepping stone to bid for the 2036 Olympic Games.
