Paris 2024: ARD and ZDF to share Seine studio for Olympics coverage

ARD and ZDF will together broadcast around 240 hours live on their linear channels and about 1,500 hours of streamed content over 17 days of the Olympics.

The German public broadcasters secured sublicensing agreements with Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) to show free-to-air coverage of Paris 2024, while WBD will offer comprehensive coverage via its own platforms Eurosport and streaming service Discovery+​.

ZDF will broadcast on eight of the 17 broadcast days, with ‘Sportstudio Live’ on ZDF from around 7:30am until midnight. Presenters Jochen Breyer and Katrin Müller-Hohenstein will alternate hosting the Olympic days from a shared studio by the Seine, overlooking the Eiffel Tower.

Read more Paris 2024: Inside Look at OBS Plans for 11,000 Hours of Games Coverage

ARD and ZDF will jointly use the studio and their National Broadcast Center in Mainz, Germany, where all the coordination for direction, production, technology, and parts of the editorial team will be managed, allowing ZDF to “offer our audience Olympic live sports during prime time over long broadcast periods – cost-effectively and efficiently,” the broadcaster said.

In addition to the ‘Sportstudio Live’ segments on TV, there will be an extensive Olympic offering on the online platform ZDFmediathek. In a joint project with ARD, up to ten parallel live streams will be available daily.

All finals, competitions involving German athletes, and international highlights will be accessible online. A total of 1,500 hours of live sports will be streamed, allowing for intensive coverage of specific competitions, ZDF said.

ZDF Olympic Program Director Anke Scholten, involved in their eighth Games as ZDF program director, said:

“The Summer Olympics are the largest sporting event in the world, and our preparations for the broadcasts are correspondingly complex and extensive.”

Speaking about ZDF sharing a studio on the Seine with ARD, Scholten said: “This studio was jointly developed but will be distinguishable through individual use.

“This is achieved by our directors’ creative work, elements of ZDF design, and much more. Essentially, the studio comes to life through the athletes who will be guests on the broadcast days, as well as through Katrin Müller-Hohenstein and Jochen Breyer, who will lead the Olympic program on ZDF.”

With ZDF to air eight days of coverage, Scholten said viewers will be engaged with the broadcaster’s coverage not just during the its linear TV coverage, but continuously via athlete portraits, interviews, and appearances and via 1,500 hours of live sports daily across up to ten parallel live streams, allowing for intensive coverage of various competitions online.

Seventeen days after the Olympics, ARD and ZDF will provide comprehensive coverage on TV and up to four live streams of the Paralympics, beginning with the opening ceremony of the Summer Paralympics on 28 August 28 on ZDF.

Read more SVG’s Paris 2024 blog