Renamed as TV9 and early history
Channel 9 was renamed and rebranded as TV9 on 17 March 2006,[59] with test transmission commenced on Saturday, 1 April 2006 with 4-hour broadcasts from 8:00 pm to midnight daily and airing music videos mostly in Malay.[60] Full launch of the channel began at noon of 22 April 2006 with 13-hour broadcasts from 12:00 pm to 1:00 am daily and a new slogan: Dekat di Hati (Malay for Close at heart).[61][62][63]
Upon its relaunch,[64][65] TV9 allocated RM20 million for the first year of its operations to provide better contents for viewers.[66][67] At the same time, it partnered with Senheng where the latter would supply its electrical equipment, including installing antennas for TV9.[68] By the end of June 2006, TV9 completed the installation of permanent transmitters on several locations in the East Coast region.[69]
By August 2006, TV9 reached 11% of Malay viewership market after 4 months of operations.[70][71]
TV9 is available via terrestrial television in Peninsular Malaysia. Since 28 December 2006, it expanded its coverage to Sabah, Sarawak through Malaysian satellite TV provider, Astro.[72][73]
For the first months of broadcast, TV9 did not have its own in-house news bulletin, except for Edisi 7 simulcasts from its sister channel, NTV7.[74] After two months, it set up its news division and held an audition looking for news anchors.[75][76] TV9 began to produce news bulletins on New Year's Day 2007, under the Berita TV9 (literally: TV9 News) brand. It is currently broadcasting two half-hour editions: a midday edition at 1:00 pm Saturday to Thursday, and its flagship nightly edition at 8:00 pm.[77][78]
Between 2007 and 2008, TV9 shared time with TV Pendidikan, the national public educational TV channel.[79] However, this was cancelled in 2009 as TV9 began daytime broadcasting while all TV Pendidikan's content moved to EduwebTV.
In May 2007, in conjunction with its first anniversary, TV9 extended its broadcasting hours from 75 hours to 85 hours a week.[80]
On 6 September 2007, TV9, along with its sister channels TV3, NTV7, and 8TV, were made available for online viewing via Media Prima's newly-launched streaming service, Catch-Up TV, which later rebranded as Tonton.[81][82][83]
On September 2008, TV9 was airing an ABS-CBN Studios-produced series titled Super Inggo which has dubbed in Malay.
On New Year's Day 2010, the channel launched a new tagline, Di Hatiku (At your heart in Malay), which has been used since its 3rd anniversary along 2009.
In September 2021, TV9 underwent a rebranding exercise, which saws its primetime slot moved to 6 pm onwards while its news bulletin shifted to 7 pm.[84][85]
Media Prima announced on 15 October 2024 that the news operations of all of its television networks, including TV9, will began broadcast at the company's Balai Berita starting 21 October after more than two decades operated at Sri Pentas, Bandar Utama.[86][87][88] On 12 March 2025, 15 days after the Sri Pentas building were closed, all of the company's TV networks logo, including TV9, were removed from its former building.[89]
Since 1 April 2016, Media Prima included home shopping block Wow Shop (formerly known as CJ Wow Shop), a collaboration between them and Korean conglomerate CJ Group, in all of its channels' lineups, including TV9. It currently airs on this channel from 6:00 am to 8:00 pm (with buffer periods at 1:00 pm from Saturday to Thursday to accommodate Berita TV9 Tengah Hari). Such long periods of teleshopping blocks have made this channel known as a part-time TV shopping channel. This block, however, attracted huge criticism by viewers through social media due to overtaking a large part of daytime schedule, previously running mostly reruns, religious programming and children's programming.[90] On 4 March 2018, Friday to Sunday breakfast show Nasi Lemak Kopi O (which formerly occupied the first two-hour block of CJ Wow Shop) ended its 10-year run and gave the home shopping block a weekend extension.
On 5 March 2018, TV9 revamped its programming lineup to solely focus on rural Malay communities in order to reduce viewership. Media Prima did so as part of its television revamp which saw its channels aligning with a specific core audience. Korean and English programmes aired on the channel were then transferred to the NTV7, which also revamped on the same day to serve the "Modern Malaysia" audience.
From 31 December 2018, Media Prima
