[3][4] NZ On Air's activities can be broken up into several areas: NZOA funds New Zealand-focused radio, television, New Zealand music and digital media production for a range of public and private broadcasters and platforms.

NZ On Air focuses on "local content" – New Zealand programmes that are expensive or risky to make which the broadcaster market cannot fully pay for.

Centralising such archiving funding was a key recommendation of the seminal Horrocks review led by NZ On Air and published in 2009.

[citation needed] In the end the fee was scrapped effective 1 July 2000, and the commission has since been directly funded by the government.

[9] NZ on Air was also criticised in 2012 for helping fund the production of The GC, a TV3 documentary series about young Māori New Zealanders living on Australia's Gold Coast[10] and for granting $30,000 to assist recording by Titanium, the winner of a radio competition to create a boy band.

The Broadcasting Standards Authority also received a complaint, but found the documentary did not break its rules on fairness, and law and order.

[16] In response to the controversy, Broadcasting Minister Kris Faafoi said NZ On Air is independent and answerable for its funding decisions.

[16] Three days later, NZ on Air released a statement saying "NZ On Air runs a contestable funding process, to which any producer, with the support of an eligible platform, can submit a funding application on any subject", and that neither Swarbrick nor the Green Party will have any editorial control, or financial benefit.