The British Broadcasting Corporation, almost always referred to by its abbreviation "the BBC",is the world's largest broadcaster.Unlike other broadcasters in the UK, it is a public service based, quasi-autonomous, statutory corporation run by the BBC Trust. In common with the public broadcasting organisations of many other European countries, it is funded yearly by a television licence fee charged to all UK households which own a television capable of receiving broadcasts, rather than being underwritten directly by the Government of the United Kingdom.

BBC World, its journalism arm, has bases or correspondents in more than 200 countries and, as officially surveyed, is available to more than 274 million households, though also possibly far more individual persons and groups than surveys can gather, and it is the oldest surviving entity of its kind. The BBC's reach is significantly more than CNN's estimated 200 million.