WNCN (channel 17) is a television station licensed to Goldsboro, North Carolina, United States, serving the Research Triangle area as an affiliate of CBS.

Built in 1988 as a second-tier independent station operating from studios in Clayton, North Carolina, under the call sign WYED, channel 17 was purchased by Outlet Communications in 1994 and replaced the anemic WRDC (channel 28) as the market's NBC affiliate in 1995, which included the establishment of a local newsroom and the adoption of the present WNCN call letters.

It operated as a small station that primarily carried programming from the Home Shopping Network (HSN), along with some religious and hunting/fishing shows that aired on weekends.

[8] However, a problem developed in another pending Krypton acquisition, of television station WTVX serving West Palm Beach, Florida, which delayed any filing of the license transfer with the FCC.

[10] Beasley retained the station, which dropped home shopping in 1991—when HSN cut its payments to affiliated stations—to air movies, older syndicated shows, and Baltimore Orioles games.

[11] The station's longstanding issue of cable carriage was resolved in 1992 when changes to federal regulations prompted Cablevision to put WYED on its basic lineup in Raleigh and Durham.

For instance, in 2015, the general manager of WITN-TV in Washington, North Carolina, noted that that station "steals" viewers in four counties in the Raleigh–Durham designated market area from WNCN because viewership habits to the eastern North Carolina station were established before WNCN was an NBC affiliate.

[28] On January 9, 2006, NBCUniversal announced it was putting WNCN up for sale,[29] along with WVTM-TV in Birmingham, Alabama, and the other two former Outlet stations, WJAR and WCMH.

The network had originally aligned with WNAO-TV, Raleigh's first TV station, in 1953 and moved to WTVD in 1958 before switching to WRAL-TV in 1985.

While, in the lead-up to the switch, WNCN emphasized the strong ratings performance of CBS programming and prime time shows,[40] as well as the NCAA Division I men's basketball tournament,[41] ratings for CBS programming in the Triangle dropped significantly with the switch to WNCN on February 29, 2016.

[43] After Outlet bought the station and in the wake of securing the NBC affiliation, hiring for a news department began even before the call letters were changed.

[23] Ron Bilek, the founding news director at WNCN, claimed the product was designed with "more of a high-tech/Triangle lifestyle look and feel".

At 11 pm, when WRAL, WTVD, and WNCN all competed head-to-head, channel 17 drew a fraction of the viewers of the other two stations.

[46] As a 4 p.m. newscast was added, news director Ron Bilek and assistant Gina Pearce resigned over "philosophical differences" that July.

[50] In 2003, WNCN news director Caroline Claeys departed after an edition of the station's 5 p.m. newscast featured two viewers, winners of a contest to present the weather on one of the station's news programs, who rapped the forecast; the Triangle Association of Black Journalists wrote a letter to WNCN, calling the stunt degrading.

[51] Claeys's permanent replacement was Nannette Wilson; under her leadership, ratings increased for the station's newscasts, though they still remained a distant third.

[57] Ratings improved in some time slots, but talent turnover and changes were also cited as a factor keeping the Raleigh–Durham news competition a "two-horse race".