[2] It was followed by Scranton-licensed WARM-TV, broadcasting on channel 16 and owned by future Governor William Scranton along with WARM radio, in February 1954.

Often, station engineers had to adjust the Effort transmitter to accept a signal from WFIL-TV (now ABC O&O WPVI-TV) in Philadelphia if they were unable to receive the New York feed.

WILK-TV and WARM-TV were both losing money, in large part because their network, ABC, was not on an equal footing with NBC and CBS (and would not be until the 1970s).

Transcontinent Television Corporation, a Buffalo, New York–based media firm, acquired a 60 percent interest in the merged station; the remaining shares were split between the WARM and WILK groups, with William Scranton as chairman.

[9][10] Despite a power boost to 1.5 million watts, and an increased coverage area—expanded to 15 counties in northeastern Pennsylvania[5]—WNEP-TV bounced back and forth in the ratings for most of the next two decades.

[15] WNEP moved to its current studios in Moosic in 1989; the facility is similar to the building the Times Company built for then-sister station WHNT-TV in Huntsville, Alabama, but on a larger scale.

[16] On January 4, 2007, the station, along with the rest of the Times Company's television division, was sold to Oak Hill Capital Partners in a $575 million transaction.

The FCC ruled that Tribune could not keep WNEP due to its ban on newspaper-television cross-ownership within a single market, The Morning Call serving a city within WNEP's coverage area (although Tribune has maintained cross-ownership waivers for its newspaper-television station combinations in Los Angeles, Chicago, Miami, and Hartford).

WNEP-TV's transmission tower broadcasting the analog signal on channel 16 collapsed on December 16, 2007, due to severe ice, winds, and snow at the transmitter location on Penobscot Knob.

The WVIA-TV analog signal on channel 44 was temporarily put off the air until service was restored through a back-up tower on Penobscot Knob.

[31] On February 15, 2010, the channel 49 facility was put back into use by WNEP on a temporary basis with FCC approval to accommodate WVIA-TV, which had suffered a partial tower collapse and electrical fire which had destroyed WVIA's transmitter building and the equipment within.

(Sinclair CEO Christopher Ripley cited Scranton–Wilkes–Barre as one of three markets, out of fourteen where ownership conflicts exist between the two groups, where the proposed acquisition would likely result in divestitures).

[34][35][36][37][38][39] To alleviate some of the regulatory issues that the deal incurred by selling certain stations to both independent and affiliated third-party companies, on April 24, 2018, Sinclair announced that it would sell the non-license assets of WOLF-TV, WQMY, and WSWB and the full assets of eight other stations – Sinclair-operated KOKH-TV in Oklahoma City, WRLH-TV in Richmond, KDSM-TV in Des Moines and WXLV-TV in Greensboro/Winston-Salem/High Point, and Tribune-owned WPMT in Harrisburg and WXMI in Grand Rapids – to Standard Media Group (an independent broadcast holding company formed by private equity firm Standard General to assume ownership of and absolve ownership conflicts involving the aforementioned stations) for $441.1 million.

[40][41][42][43][44] On July 18, 2018, the FCC voted to have the Sinclair–Tribune acquisition reviewed by an administrative law judge amid "serious concerns" about Sinclair's forthrightness in its applications to sell certain conflict properties.

Tribune also filed a breach of contract lawsuit in the Delaware Chancery Court, alleging that Sinclair engaged in protracted negotiations with the FCC and the U.S. Department of Justice's Antitrust Division over regulatory issues, refused to sell stations in markets where it already had properties, and proposed divestitures to parties with ties to Sinclair executive chair David D. Smith that were rejected or highly subject to rejection to maintain control over stations it was required to sell.

[51][52][53][54][55][56] On December 3, 2018, Irving, Texas–based Nexstar Media Group—which has owned NBC affiliate WBRE-TV since 1997 and operated CBS affiliate WYOU-TV since 1996 (running the latter through a shared services agreement with Mission Broadcasting since 1998 after selling the license to acquire WBRE through a grandfathered LMA)—announced it would acquire the assets of Tribune Media for $6.4 billion in cash and debt.

(Furthermore, any attempt by Nexstar to assume the operations of WNEP through local marketing or shared services agreements would have been subject to regulatory hurdles that could have delayed completion of the FCC and Justice Department's review and approval process for the acquisition.)

The station also participates in several local charity events, including the MDA Labor Day Telethon (which ended in 2014) and Scranton's annual Santa Parade.

WNEP has led the ratings in northeastern Pennsylvania for most of the last 40 years and according to Nielsen data attracts more viewers than the other stations in the market combined.

Marisa Burke, a native of nearby Danville, had been with the station since 1984 and solo anchored the noon news and co-anchored the weeknight 6 o'clock newscast with Scott Schaffer.

Recurring features of news broadcasts include the station's scale model train set in the background of its weather deck and garden and the viewer response segment Talkback 16.

In November 2009, after being unable to reach an agreement with WNEP on a contract extension, WOLF announced its intention to turn to WBRE to produce an hour-long 10 p.m. newscast beginning January 1, 2010.

Since 1994, the station has used as its new theme song an updated version of Al Ham's "Move Closer to Your World", which is composed by Cliff Schwarz.

[78][79] On March 4, 2020, the station began using Tegna's standardized news graphics but retained the Schwarz version of "Move Closer to Your World" as its theme as opposed to using "C Clarity", seen somewhat as a compromise.

[75] A live interview by WNEP reporter Sofia Ojeda (later with Houston NBC affiliate KPRC-TV) on August 1, 2014, at the Wayne County Fair made a social-media sensation of 5-year-old Noah Ritter.

"[82] John Oliver from HBO's Last Week Tonight with John Oliver mentioned the conflict of viewers over the station's scale model train set in the background of its weather deck and garden (including 'agree/disagree' comments on the station's viewer comment line, which air in the newscasts' Talkback 16 segment).

This resulted in the show building a larger-scale train set for the station with the landmarks of Scranton and the surrounding area exaggerated.

Though the station accepted it, it proved to be too large for the weather deck/garden, and was donated to Scranton's Electric City Trolley Museum for display beginning in late September 2017, with some modifications (including its tunnel now being presented as Oliver's mouth wide open rather than that of area native P. J.

WNEP was carried for many years on the two cable providers in the Lehigh Valley until it was declared part of the Philadelphia (WPVI) market in January 2013.

From then on both Service Electric and RCN decided to drop WNEP due to the inability to broadcast duplicate programming from two ABC affiliates.