TV3 (Latvia)

What is TV3?

TV3 is a commercial television channel in Latvia. The media regulator, the Nacionālā elektronisko plašsaziņas līdzekļu padome (NEPLP), lists it among commercial television programmes with national coverage, held by SIA All Media Latvia under licence AA-214/1, valid until 10 February 2034, at Dzelzavas iela 120G, Rīga. The list was last updated on 8 September 2026.^[1]

The same list gives All Media Latvia three further programmes: TV3 Life, with national coverage under licence AA-106/2, valid until 28 February 2030; and two cross-border programmes, TV3 Mini under AA-106/3, valid until 28 February 2030, and TV6 under AA-198/1, valid until 7 May 2032.^[1]

The channel's own site, tv3.lv, where sport sits on the path tv3.lv/sports, returned a redirect error on every retrieval, so nothing here is taken from it. Reporters Without Borders, in its 2026 entry, writes: “In addition to the public broadcaster LSM, there is a solid set of privately owned media outlets, including the TV3 Group, the DELFI news site and the Baltic Centre for Investigative Journalism (Re:Baltica), as well as local media outlets.”^[6]

What does TV3 cover?

Fifty5Blue's release of 10 September 2025 lists, as the third most-watched broadcast of August 2025, “Eiropas meistarsacīkstes basketbolā. Latvija – Igaunija” on TV3.^[2] That tournament has finished.

FIBA, in an undated release, states: “Starting in November 2025 and spanning a four-year period, international basketball will be broadcast on multiple major media services in the three countries following two deals.” The first, it states, “renews an agreement between FIBA and long-standing partner TV3 Group”; the second gives rights to the public broadcasters, LTV among them. FIBA adds that TV3 Group will have “exclusive complete coverage of the FIBA events on its Go3 services throughout the Baltics region” and that “Selected games will also be available on its flagship free-to-air TV3 and TV6 channels in Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.” Those are FIBA's words.^[7]

The retrieved Fifty5Blue lists for May and August 2026 name no TV3 sport broadcast among the top three.^[3][4]

How large is TV3's audience?

Fifty5Blue, the audience-measurement company formerly named Kantar Latvia, publishes monthly shares of consolidated television viewing time, counting viewing at broadcast time and time-shifted viewing up to seven days afterwards.^[4]

Its figures for TV3 are 9.3 per cent in August 2025, second behind LTV1 with 10.9 per cent and ahead of TV6, another All Media Latvia programme, with 3.1 per cent; 8.9 per cent in May 2026, third behind LTV1 and LTV7; and 8.5 per cent in August 2026, second behind LTV1 with 13.5 per cent.^[2][3][4] The EuroBasket game Latvija–Igaunija on TV3 in August 2025 is given a rating of 6.6 per cent and 113.8 thousand viewers.^[2] The August 2026 release puts it in these words: “Otrs skatītākais TV kanāls bija TV3 ar 8,5% skatīšanās laika daļu”.^[4] Each is one month's reading of the channel as a whole, not of its sport.

For the website, Gemius's ranking of audited Latvian websites for August 2026, published on 7 September 2026 and covering users aged 15 to 75 connecting from Latvia, places tv3.lv seventh, with 533,100 real users. That is one month's reading for the whole domain.^[8]

Since when has TV3 existed?

No founding date for TV3 in Latvia was retrieved from the broadcaster or from the regulator, and none is given here. The regulator's list gives the current licence's validity, to 10 February 2034, but not its date of issue.^[1]

The ownership record is dated. The Euromedia Ownership Monitor's Latvia report, by Anda Rožukalne of Rīga Stradiņš University and published in December 2025, records SIA “All Media Latvia” as 100 per cent owned by UAB All Media Group, which it records as 100 per cent owned by Providence Equity Partners LLC in the United States.^[5] Broadband TV News reported on 29 January 2026: “All Media Group sits within Bite Group, which is majority owned by Providence Equity Partners.”^[9] The two sources describe the chain differently, and both are given.

Why does TV3 matter in Latvia's sport?

TV3 is one of the national commercial channels on the regulator's list, and in every monthly release retrieved it held one of the three largest shares of viewing time.^[1][2][3][4] In August 2025 it carried a Latvia game of EuroBasket, and FIBA names it among the free-to-air channels for selected FIBA games from November 2025.^[2][7]

The Euromedia Ownership Monitor states: “Among the analyzed outlets, only TV3 publicly disclosed information about its beneficial owners in accordance with Article 6(1) of the European Media Freedom Act and Article 3(6a) of Directive (EU) 2015/849.”^[5] Reporters Without Borders, in its 2026 entry, states: “Media ownership is generally transparent and does not raise concerns about market dominance, but greater diversity would foster media pluralism.”^[6] RSF also states: “Both private and public media outlets are faced with financial difficulties that are exacerbated by digital platforms.”^[6] Those are the monitoring bodies' words.