| Callsign: | WXXI-TV |
| Branding: | WXXI |
| Digital: | 22 (UHF) |
| Virtual: | 21 |
| Country: | United States |
| Founded: | 1966 |
| Location: | Rochester, New York |
| Callsign Meaning: | "XXI" is the Roman numeral for 21 |
| Owner: | WXXI Public Broadcasting Council |
| Former Affiliations: | NET (1966–1970) |
| Erp: | 273 kW |
| Haat: | 1520NaN0 |
| Facility Id: | 57274 |
| Coordinates: | 43.1353°N -77.5839°W |
| Licensing Authority: | FCC |
WXXI-TV (channel 21) is a PBS member television station in Rochester, New York, United States. It is owned by the WXXI Public Broadcasting Council alongside NPR members WXXI (1370 AM), WXXI-FM (105.9), and WXXO (91.5 FM). The three outlets share studios at 280 State Street near downtown Rochester; WXXI-TV's transmitter is located on Pinnacle Hill on the border between Rochester and Brighton.
WXXI-TV's national public television productions include A Warrior in Two Worlds, Echoes from the Ancients, Out of the Fire, Albert Paley: Man of Steel, Biz Kid$, and Flight to Freedom. WXXI-TV also produced Assignment: The World, a weekly current-events program for schools, which aired on approximately 100 public television stations nationwide, and was the nation's longest-running instructional television program. Due to funding cuts, it was canceled and its last episode aired on May 23, 2013.
ThinkBright, broadcast from 6 p.m. to 6 a.m. on 21.3 until the digital transition.
WXXI-TV entered the digital era in September 2003 when it signed on with Rochester's first full-power digital television signal.
The station's signal is multiplexed:
| Res. | Aspect | Short name | Programming | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 21.1 | WXXI-HD | PBS | |||
| 21.2 | WXXI-W | World | |||
| 21.3 | WXXI-C | ||||
| 21.4 | WXXI-K | PBS Kids | |||
| 22.7 | WXXI-FM | WXXI Classical | |||
| 480i | 16:9 | TBD | TBD (WUHF-DT4) | ||
Channel 21.4, now PBS Kids since February 1, 2016, was originally a digital standard definition simulcast of WXXI-TV's analog signal.
WXXI-TV discontinued regular programming on its analog signal, over UHF channel 21, on June 12, 2009, the official date on which full-power television stations in the United States transitioned from analog to digital broadcasts under federal mandate. The station's digital signal remained on its pre-transition UHF channel 16,[1] using virtual channel 21.
As part of the SAFER Act,[2] WXXI-TV kept its analog signal on the air until July 10, 2009, to inform viewers of the digital television transition through a loop of public service announcements from the National Association of Broadcasters. WXXI-TV had been awarded a $202,498 federal contract for an outreach initiative to help Rochester's over-the-air viewers prepare for the digital transition.[3]