HBO (Home Box Office) is an American pay television network owned by Home Box Office, Inc. and WarmerMedia Entertainment. The channel broadcasts feature films, documentaries, original TV programs, comedy and music specials.

HBO’s founder, Charles Dolan, was a Teleguide developer and a pioneer of the commercial use of cables. In 1971 during his family vacation in France, he had the idea to create a cable-oriented TV channel called The Green Channel (now HBO), a service that would stream major Hollywood movies and live sporting events without ads showing in between.

HBO was launched on November 8, 1972, and it’s the oldest and longest operating television service in the USA. Its headquarters are at 30 Hudson Yards in Manhattan’s West Side district.

On September 30, 1975, HBO showed “The Thrilla in Manila”, a heavyweight championship boxing match between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier. It marked the first time a TV signal had streamed its signal via satellite and with that, HBO became the first national cable channel. HBO was also the first network to stream the same program, at the same time, both in the Eastern and Western halves of the country.

As a service provider, HBO has seven 24-hour channels, which include HBO, HBO Family and HBO Latino. Other HBO channels are HBO2, HBO Comedy, HBO Signature and HBO Zone. As a business unit, HBO is WarnerMedia’s most profitable service, with $2 billion generated in profits per year. HBO has more than 140 million subscribers worldwide, with a third of these based in the USA.

In the 1990s, HBO began to focus more on airing high-quality original programs.Some of HBO’s most successful series are Sex and the City, The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, Game of Thrones and True Blood. A significant part of HBO’s programming schedule also includes major sports, such as boxing, basketball and football games. The network had a long-lasting tradition of telecasting boxing matches until September 27, 2018, when they stopped showing live sports events.

Part of HBO’s programming schedule used to feature comedy. Many stand-up comedians had their own shows on HBO, and this trend led to the Comedy Channel being created. Two years later, it rebranded to the well-known channel Comedy Central.

Being an industry leader, HBO faced major challenges along the way. By 1983, it had more than 12 million subscribers, and that scared bigger studios such as Paramount, Warner Bros and MCA. As a result, they teamed up with Viacom to launch two competitive network services, Showtime and The Movie Channel.

Due to its diverse programming schedule, HBO’s target audience ranges from 18 to 64 years of age.

Hulu Live TV 

• 7-day free trial
• $54.99 a month with more than 60 channels available
• Get HBO for an additional $15 a month
• Compatible with multiple devices including Android, iOS, Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Roku, Xbox and more
• Stream on two devices at once
• Upgrade to unlimited simultaneous streams for $15 a month
• 50 hours of Cloud DVR time on offer

AT&T TV Now

• 7-day free trial
• Costs $50 a month for 45+ channels (including HBO)
• Available to stream on Apple TV, Amazon Fire TV, Chromecast, Chrome, Android and iOS devices
• 2 devices can stream simultaneously
• 20 hours of Cloud DVR recording time
• 40,000 titles available in the on-demand library