As is so often the case in life, it's a case of squeezing a balloon. In order to get more of one thing, you have to have less of another.

In this case, to have more reliability in transmission, you have to have fewer choices.

I can't speak to the UK's digital situation, but in the U.S. there are 50 channels available in a theoretical city. Assuming that digital has fewer co-channel issues than analog (most of my TV experience is analog), that means 25 signals. On those 25 signals, some broadcasters squeeze up to 10 channels, which all look like garbage. For a decent picture, it's closer to four — maybe five.

So that means 100 to 125 theoretical OTA channels.

If people could actually receive 125 OTA channels with good programming on them, or even the same content as is offered on cable/satellite, I believe many would drop pay TV in a heartbeat, and wouldn't be forced to also scrounge for content on Netflix and YouTube and Prime Video.

If anyone has information on the theoretical maximum number of TV channels possible in a single location in the UK, I'd like to hear about it.

I’d be shocked if 125 good channels would convince people to give up on-demand streaming services. 125 really is not a whole lot when you need to satisfy everybody, and the need to obey someone else’s schedule really sucks.