A generalist channel is a television or radio channel whose target audience is not confined to a particular set of people, but instead aims to offer a wide range of programs and program genres to a diverse general public.
Generalist TV channels focus on general entertainment.
[11][12] A book published in 2010 cited a study saying that generalist television channels comprised 41 percent of global television market value and accounted for 70 percent of global television market volume.
[13] With the growth in popularity of television, generalist channels such as full service radio greatly declined in radio, and are now mostly limited to public broadcasting stations.
Generalist and full-service multichannel television channels have been the most heavily damaged by the shift to streaming television; in the United States, generalist channels such as TNT, TBS and USA have seen their viewership decline far more rapidly than the industry average, which itself has seen a sharp decline in viewership.