HD+

The HD+ service launched on November 1, 2009, with two channels, RTL HD and Vox HD. Sat.1 HD, ProSieben HD and kabel eins HD were added on January 31, 2010.

Sport1 HD (previously DSF) joined the service on the first anniversary of the launch of HD+, on November 1, 2010, becoming the first channel in the HD+ package from outside the RTL and ProSiebenSat.1 groups. On December 1, 2010, HD versions of German women's entertainment channel sixx (owned by ProSiebenSat.1 Media) and entertainment channel RTL II launched in HD on HD+. In June 2011, Comedy Central and nickelodeon from MTV Networks joined the HD+ platform and it was announced that news channel, N24 would join HD+ from July, bringing the number of channels offered to 11.

In October 2011 Tele5 HD launched on HD+ and on May 1, 2012, Super RTL launched a high definition version of the RTL/Disney owned channel on the HD+ platform alongside Discovery's DMAX channel. The 15th channel to join HD+ was adult pop music channel Deluxe Music, in December 2012.

Disney Channel HD left the German pay-TV platform, Sky Deutschland in November 2013 to relaunch on HD+ on January 17, 2014, as an advertising-financed service. In April 2014 HD+ added the news channel n-tv HD, male orientated entertainment channels ProSieben Maxx HD and RTL Nitro HD, and women's lifestyle channel TLC HD to the line-up, bringing the total number of channels in the service to 20.

In the months leading up to the launch of HD+, it had been reported that MTV – already broadcasting in HD from Astra 19.2°E – was in discussions to join the package but it was only some six years after those discussions, on September 1, 2014, that MTV HD left the Sky Deutschland pay-TV platform and became the 21st channel to join HD+. However, MTV HD was not available for customers that viewed HD+ via Sky Deutschland (as there was no VideoGuard encryption enabled for MTV HD) until 21 October 2015. In October, the number of channels was reduced back to 20 when Viacom reorganized its channels in Germany. Comedy Central was no longer available via HD+ and Nickelodeon, which previously shared its channel with Comedy Central, increased its broadcast hours to 24 hours a day.

On January 1, 2015, the women's channel Sat.1 Gold started broadcasting in HD on the HD+ platform, the last of ProSiebenSat.1's SD channels to launch in HD

In September 2015, HD+ started broadcasts of the ultra-high-definition television (UHD) demonstration channel, UHD1, showing sports, culture, lifestyle, and nature video clips and trailers.

On October 4, 2016, INsight TV HD, an action and extreme sports channel from TV Entertainment Reality Network (TERN) became the 22nd HD+ channel and on December 1, 2016, Eurosport 1 HD started broadcasting on the HD+ platform. In August 2017 Eurosport announced that HD+ subscribers could add access to live sports coverage on the Eurosport 2 HD Xtra channel for an additional €5/month.

Service fees and reception equipment

Included in the purchase price of HD+ reception equipment is an HD+ smart card valid for a free introductory trial of all channels in the HD+ service. At the launch of the HD+ service the trial period was 12 months; this was reduced to 6 months in November 2013. At the end of the free viewing period, the validity of the card can be extended for a further year on payment of the annual service fee (€50 at the time of the service launch), either direct to HD+ or in stores. In May 2014 the annual service fee, after expiry of the free viewing period, was increased from €50 to €60 and a monthly payment plan of €5.00/month was introduced. In February 2017, the annual subscription was increased to €70 and the monthly fee raised to €5.75. In March 2021, subscription fees were raised to €75 (annual) and €6 (monthly).

Initially, the main route to HD+ reception was with the set-top boxes especially designed for HD+, connected to a satellite dish pointing at Astra 19.2°E, with an HD+ Nagravision smart card. Other satellite receivers or TV sets equipped with a CI+ slot can be fitted with an HD+ conditional-access module (CAM), bought from HD+ or in stores along with the HD+ smart card.

Since June 2011, all the HD+ channels have been additionally encrypted with VideoGuard to be available to Sky Deutschland subscribers without any HD+ equipment. Sky subscribers with a standard Sky HD satellite receiver and smartcard are able to watch and record the HD+ channels, along with the Sky HD channels and free-to-air German HD channels which also broadcast from Astra 19.2°E.

Since September 2011, HD+ channels can also be received via Entertain Sat from Deutsche Telekom and, since January 2013, thanks to an agreement with the German broadcasting and broadband communications association (FRK), via some small and medium-sized cable networks.

Service criticism, accolades and uptake

In the lead-up to, and after the launch of HD+, there was some criticism of the service because of the amount of content actually made in HD. Although initially, mainly only US movies and US series were broadcast in native HD, the proportion of HD programmes broadcast increased. By 2013, most in-house productions and almost all major sports events were produced and broadcast in HD. By May 2013, RTL HD was broadcasting more than 90 percent of its programming in native HD and by the end of 2014 ProSiebenSat1 Media AG broadcast "with a few exceptions, the entire prime time lineup of Sat1 HD, ProSieben HD, Kabel eins HD and sixx HD in native HD".

The decision to charge for access to the HD+ package, while promoting it as free TV, and the limitations imposed on the service's use (some channels announced they were going to deny the viewer the ability to record broadcasts to watch later or fast-forwarding during commercials) was met with some criticism within Germany. However, Ferdinand Kayser, then president and CEO of SES Astra, denied that HD+ is pay-TV. "HD+ is free TV," he said in September 2009 at the IFA consumer electronics show in Berlin, and compared the commercial arrangements to cable TV, in which access to free channels costs money. He said that the annual cost of HD+ is a service fee "which is related to the reception of the offer and not to specific content, parts or packages of the offer".

HD+ has achieved several awards in German specialist publications. In 2018 Video Magazin gave HD+ a "very good" test rating, in 2019, the HD+ HbbTV Operator App in Panasonic's integrated HD+ TV sets was awarded "Best use of HbbTV for operator applications" by the HbbTV Association, and the integration of HD+ into TV sets and the HD+ Komfort-Funktion has received the test rating "very good" in Audiovision (issue 6/2019), Digital Television (8/2019), Satvision (6/2019) and Video (7/2019), "top notch" in av-magazin.de (issue 8/2019), and "innovation" in Sat-Magazin (issue 3/2019).

In May 2011 – some 18 months after the launch of the service – HD+ CEO, Wilfried Urner said that "In a country where the question of whether people are willing to pay for television has been discussed for more than 20 years, the first figures of HD+ are certainly remarkable. A conversion rate of 66 percent is clearly above the expectations, and the active renewal of the HD+ service by so many people after one year is an outstanding result".

In the first few years after the launch of the service, the uptake of HD+ was as follows: