The National (TV program)

The National (officially CBC News: The National) is a Canadian national television news program which serves as the flagship broadcast for the English-language news division of CBC News by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It reports on major Canadian and international news stories, airing on CBC Television stations nationwide Sunday to Friday at 10:00 p.m. local time (10:30 p.m. NT).

The program is also aired on CBC News Network; on weekdays, the initial version that airs live to Atlantic Canada on the main network is simulcast on CBC News Network at 9:00 p.m. ET, with several repeat broadcasts overnight. Until August 2005, The National was seen in the United States on the defunct Newsworld International channel; the program continues to be aired occasionally on C-SPAN when that network wants to provide coverage of a major Canadian news story, or a Canadian angle for a world or American event.

The National and other CBC newscasts, including CBC owned-and-operated stations' (O&Os) early-evening local newscasts, are streamed on the CBC website; those residing outside of Canada may not be able to view some content. The show is also aired in Australia on SBS and made available on SBS ON Demand.

The National's sister French-language newscast is Le Téléjournal, aired on the Radio-Canada TV network.

The National used to run a news headlines segment for 20 to 25 minutes without commercial interruption. This format has been relaxed or reinstated at various points over the years. Subsequent segments would consist of documentaries or other feature reports, either in the form of a separate program (The Journal or The Magazine) or as additional segments of the main program.

The opening segment generally runs 15 to 20 minutes, followed by additional segments of varying length featuring additional stories, features, or panel discussions. Long-form documentaries or feature reports are not as common as they were prior to 2009, but are featured from time to time, particularly during the Friday and Sunday editions. The broadcast contains some live inserts but some of the broadcast's segments are taped prior to the program's airtime. The anchor begins every broadcast by saying "Thanks for joining us" or "Thank you for joining us". Because of the length and the story count of the first two segments, the anchor concludes the first segment of the broadcast by saying "We're back in two" and the second segment of the broadcast by saying "The National breaks down the stories shaping our world, next" or "The National takes you deeper into the stories shaping our world, next". Since 2023, the news segment of the show has been followed by a segment called "The Breakdown". The anchor begins the segment by saying "Now it's time to dig deeper into the stories shaping our world." The program concludes with a final segment called "The Moment".

From October 2009 to September 2012, weekday (and, on some stations, Sunday) airings on CBC O&Os ended at 10:55 p.m. with the anchor handing over to 10-minute local news bulletins that overlapped the normal 11:00 p.m. start time of the competing CTV National News. On CBC News Network, the weekday editions continued to run a full hour during this period; separate final segments, both pre-taped, were used for the 55- and 60-minute versions. Private affiliates, some of which had already been airing 11:00 p.m. local newscasts prior to the implementation of the 55-minute format, had the option of carrying either the 55- or 60-minute version. On September 17, 2012, with many CBC O&Os extending late local news to 30 minutes, The National reverted to a single 60-minute format on weeknights and Sundays. (Those stations which continue to produce 10-minute late local newscasts now air them starting at 11:00, followed by a condensed 20-minute version of The Exchange before rejoining the network schedule at 11:30.)

From 2009 to 2017, a 30-minute Saturday edition of The National (essentially a rebranding of the long-standing Saturday Report) generally aired on CBC Television at 6:00 p.m. ET during the season of Hockey Night in Canada (or if other live CBC Sports broadcasts are scheduled for that evening), and 6:00 local (7:00 AT, 7:30 NT) otherwise, with updated editions throughout the evening on CBC News Network. However, beginning in the early 2010s, most CBC stations in eastern Canada began to carry local newscasts in that timeslot instead, or used a local opt-out at 6:20 ET. Just before the fall 2017 relaunch, the Saturday edition was discontinued altogether in favour of additional segments of CBC News Network's rolling coverage, with the 6:00 p.m. ET segment, simulcast on CBC Television in western Canada, serving as the CBC's de facto network TV newscast of record on Saturdays.