According to the BBC’s annual plan for 2024/2025, total hours of first-run commissions for children’s channels CBBC and CBeebies will decline this year, but BBC Bitesize—the pubcaster’s online educational resource for four- to 16-year-olds—is poised for growth after securing a three-year, US$7.5-million top-up investment.

The Beeb has earmarked the extra funds to mark the 25th anniversary of Bitesize and support more generations of students, beginning with “improving content discovery, content recommendation and self-curation,” said BBC boss Tim Davie in a statement. 

In the short term, the investment will be used to strengthen the platform’s personalization and functionality, making it easier for students to find the content they need to make homework and studying simpler, according to the plan.   

As for new content, Bitesize is rolling out more exam-style quizzes—which proved popular with students during the 2023 exam period—along with additional physics and chemistry podcasts in partnership with BBC Sounds.

On the TV side of things, CBBC’s Bitesize morning block will continue to broadcast at least 45 hours of formal education content, along with factual series. And to mark the 100th anniversary of education at the BBC, a special live lesson will be broadcast on CBBC and online teaching resource platform BBC Teach. 

Additionally, BBC Children’s and Education will work with BBC Studios this year to make a “handful” of small pilots to test the effectiveness of the Bitesize brand and its educational content in international markets. (No further details about these pilots or the strategy were included in the annual plan.)

Davie also teased that the BBC will commission a “landmark” science series for kids, as well as a new coding series for four- to six-year-olds from the creators of the hit CBeebies shows Numberblocks and Alphablocks. 

Despite these targeted investments, CBBC and CBeebies will both take a hit this year as the pubcaster’s only channels to see a reduction in hours of first-run commissions (2% less for CBBC and 5% less for CBeebies).

CBBC will add approximately 245 hours of first-run content as part of its 5,500 total programming hours this year (3,600 hours on TV and 1,900 hours on BBC iPlayer). And the plan is for CBeebies to take on about 24 first-run titles, comprising 95 hours, and air around 5,000 total programming hours (4,500 hours on TV and 500 hours on iPlayer).  BBC commissions will make up roughly 70% of this first-run programming on both channels. 

The reduction in first-run hours marks a shift from 2023, when the pubcaster increased kids commissions by 23% (37 orders compared to 31 in 2022), according to new data from Ampere Analysis. 

Looking ahead, the Beeb is expecting its operating deficit to increase by 40% to US$620 million next year, which could spell more trouble for its homegrown kids content growth.   

The complete 2024/25 annual plan is available on the BBC’s website.