Public-access television (sometimes called community-access television) is traditionally a form of non-commercial mass media where the general public can create content television programming which is narrowcast through cable television specialty channels. Public-access television was created in the United States between 1969 and 1971 by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), under Chairman Dean Burch, based on pioneering work and advocacy of George Stoney, Red Burns (Alternate Media Center), and Sidney Dean (City Club of NY).

Public-access television is often grouped with public, educational, and government access television channels, under the acronym PEG.

In the United States, the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) produces public television, offering an educational television broadcasting service of professionally produced, highly curated content. It is not public-access television, and has no connection with cable-only PEG television channels. Although non-commercial educational television bears some resemblance to the E of PEG, PBS bears little resemblance to public-access television.

PBS generally does not offer local programming content. Instead, it broadcasts content produced for a national audience distributed via satellites. There is no generally accepted right of access for citizens to use broadcast studio facilities of PBS member stations, nor right of access by community content producers to the airwaves stewarded by these television stations outside of some universities or technical colleges such as Milwaukee's Milwaukee Area Technical College, which owns the area's two PBS member stations and offers students the limited ability (within FCC guidelines) to produce their own programs to air on a public television station for television production experience. These qualities are in stark contrast to PEG channel content, which is mostly locally produced, especially in conjunction with local origination studio facilities. And in the case of the P, public-access television, the facilities and channel capacity are uncurated free-speech zones available to anyone for free or little cost.

Since 53% to 60% of public television's revenues come from private membership donations and grants, most stations solicit individual donations by methods including fundraising, pledge drives, or telethons which can disrupt regularly scheduled programming. PBS is also funded by the federal government of the United States.

PEG channels are generally funded by cable television companies through revenues derived from cable television franchise fees, member fees, grants and contributions.

Public, educational, and government access television (also PEG-TV, PEG channel, PEGA, local-access television) refers to three different cable television narrowcasting and specialty channels. Public-access television was created in the United States between 1969 and 1971 by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and has since been mandated under the Cable Communications Act of 1984, which is codified under 47 USC § 531. PEG channels consist of:

The channel numbering, signal quality, and tier location of these channels are usually negotiated with a local authority, but often, these choices are made with the intention of one or more of the parties involved to marginalize one channel and emphasize another, such as placing government access on channel 3 or 10, educational access on a channel numerically near a PBS station, and public access in the high 90s or higher on a digital-only service tier. Various cable TV companies have marginalized PEG programming in other ways, such as moving some or all of them to a sub-menu on the cable box, giving subscribers limited bandwidth access (and limited picture quality) to the channel, while also separating the PEG channels from the commercial channel lineup in an effort to fulfill their franchise obligations while discouraging the channels' use, and hopefully eliminate the PEG channels that have the least political power.