Catch-up TV: replay past programmes from the guide

Catch-up (also called archive or timeshift) means replaying a programme your provider still keeps on their server. Zapline does not create that archive and does not include any channels — it only builds a playable catch-up URL when the playlist or panel says an archive exists.

What catch-up is — and is not

If a channel advertises catch-up, past (and sometimes in-progress) programmes can be opened again from the guide for a limited number of days. That archive lives with your provider. Zapline reads the tags or API flags, checks that the programme start still falls inside the advertised window, and — when it does — offers playback from the guide.

How it appears in Zapline

• Guide blocks that are still inside the archive window can show a catch-up affordance.
• Opening a programme detail may offer Watch for a past item, or Watch from Start when that programme is still on air, alongside playing the channel live.
• If the channel has no catch-up info, or the programme has aged out of the window, those replay actions are simply not offered.

How providers advertise catch-up

On M3U playlists, Zapline recognizes common attributes on a channel line:

• catchup / catchup-type with optional catchup-source and catchup-days
• Xtream-style tv-archive / tv_archive flags, plus duration hints such as tv-archive-duration or timeshift

Those map to the URL styles popular players expect: a full catchup-source template, a suffix appended to the stream URL, a utc/lutc query shift, Flussonic archive path rewriting, and Xtream /timeshift/… URLs.

For Xtream Codes logins, many get.php playlists omit archive tags. Zapline can also query the panel's live-streams listing and mark channels that report tv_archive, including how many days the archive reaches.

Limits to expect

• No archive, no catch-up. If the provider does not keep programmes, Zapline has nothing to replay.
• The day window is theirs. Replay is limited to the advertised number of days back from now.
• Bad templates yield no button. Catch-up sources that cannot be turned into an absolute URL are ignored so the guide does not offer a dead Watch control.

Related reading: what XMLTV is, and fixing an empty guide.