| Zone Romantica | |
| Launch Date: | Central & Eastern Europe: 1 March 1998 UK & Ireland: 3 September 2007 |
| Closed Date: | UK & Ireland: 16 November 2009 Hungary: 2 July 2012 Central & Eastern Europe: 3 December 2012 |
| Picture Format: | 576i (SDTV) |
| Country: | United Kingdom |
| Area: | Europe |
| Network: | Chello Zone/Chello Central Europe |
| Owner: | Chellomedia Liberty Global |
| Former Names: | Romantica (Until 2006) |
| Replaced By: | Romania: Romantica (2007–2012) UK & Ireland: CBS Drama (2009) Hungary & Romania: Film Café (2012) Central & Eastern Europe: CBS Drama (2012) Poland: CBS Action (2012) Polsat Romans (2013) |
| Sister Channels: | Zone Club Zone Europa Zone Fantasy Zone Horror Zone Reality Zone Thriller |
| Website: | zoneromantica.tv romantica.tv UK |
Zone Romantica (formerly Romantica) was a European TV channel that launched in 1998. The channel broadcast a mixture of telenovelas, music and entertainment from all over the world, but mainly from Latin America. The channel was available 24 hours a day, to 20 territories across Europe and the Middle East. The channel reached 8 million subscribers.
The channel launched on Sky Digital in the UK and Ireland on 3 September 2007. It was broadcasting between 8 a.m. and 3 a.m. from the start.[1] It slot on the Sky EPG had been purchased from BEN TV.[2]
On 6 May 2008 it was one of the channels that were on the free-to-air platform Freesat platform from the start.[3]
On 14 September 2009, it was revealed that the international arm of CBS, CBS Studios International, struck a joint venture deal with Chellomedia to launch six CBS-branded channels in the UK during 2009. The new channels would replace Zone Romantica, Zone Thriller, Zone Horror and Zone Reality, plus timeshift services Zone Horror +1 and Zone Reality +1.[4] [5] On 1 October 2009, it was announced that CBS Reality, CBS Reality +1, CBS Drama and CBS Action would launch on 16 November 2009 replacing Zone Reality, Zone Reality +1, Zone Romantica and Zone Thriller. On 5 April 2010, Zone Horror and Zone Horror +1 were rebranded as Horror Channel and Horror Channel +1, following the rebrand of the portfolio's other three channels in November 2009.[6]
On 2 July 2012, Hungarian version of Zone Romantica is replaced by Film Café.[7] On 1 August 2012 Chellomedia revealed that all European versions of the Zone Channels would be rebranded into CBS Channels.[8] CBS Action replaced Zone Romantica on 3 December 2012. On 1 September 2013 Zone Romantica Has Completely Closed Replacing Polsat Romans on Poland.On 3 December 2012 in Europe Zone Romantica has rebranded to CBS Drama.
Programme Line-up for UK/Éire features 3 Classic First Run US Daytime Soap Operas.