It's Official: MTV's Music-Only Channels Are Casualties of 2026
I guess streaming killed the video star.
Published Jan. 5 2026, 9:27 a.m. ET
Gone are the days of waking up to Saturday morning cartoons and MTV's music video countdown. MTV used to be the place where you could discover new artists and hear your favorite songs. But now, smartphones, social media, and music streaming apps like Spotify have allowed us to have new music at our fingertips.
Streaming has its own pitfalls, but it does make it so that small artists have a better chance of reaching new fans than they would if they had to work their way up to MTV's Top 40 chart. However, it's still hard to believe that MTV as we know it is really gone.
MTV's music-only channels have been shut down.
After 44 years of broadcasting music videos, concerts, and countdowns, MTV's music-only channels are no more, according to Rolling Stone. Yahoo says this includes channels like MTV Music, MTV '80s, MTV '90s, Club MTV, and MTV Live, which shut down on Dec. 31, 2025.
"Video Killed The Radio Star," the first song that played on MTV in 1981, was the final song MTV played before it officially clocked out. MTV's main channel still exists, but its focus will be reality TV content, rather than music videos. Iconic reality TV shows like Jersey Shore and Catfish did bring new eyes to MTV, after all.
The change came after MTV's parent company, Paramount Global, merged with Skydance.
The company wanted to cut costs after the merger. Some of MTV's award shows, like the MTV Europe Music Awards and MTV Latin America’s MIAW Awards, were also cut.
CEO David Ellison said he wants to “revitalize” MTV and other cable channels, according to Rolling Stone, but he did not specify what that means. The company is reportedly talking about turning MTV into a streaming service like Spotify or YouTube, but there aren't concrete plans or dates tied to those ideas.
Fans seem disappointed about MTV's music channels leaving.
On a Reddit post about the change, many lamented that they'll miss having MTV as an option to play music videos. One person wrote, "MTV once was for the music industry what Spotify is today. RIP," and another said, "This makes me sad because I love music videos and grew up watching them when I came home from school. I still watch them on Pluto when I need something in the background."
"This will possibly be the worst decade for music videos," one MTV fan predicted. "I was there for the beginning, and I will be there for the end. Thanks for the memories MTV," perhaps sums it up best.