Digital switchover - UK is ready

Ofcom says that almost 90% of UK homes now have access to cable or digital TV.

Its latest report reveals that 87.6% of households in the UK have "multi-channel TV" meaning access to more than just the terrestrial channels.

More than 22 million households now have digital television on their main TV set.

And the take-up looks set to continue.

In the last 3 months of last year, cable enjoyed its strongest growth in 7 years as people rushed out to buy TVs with integrated Freeview and cable.

According to the research, 524,500 households signed up to digital in the last quarter up to December, while more than 280,000 households went for digital cable and satellite platforms.

The top seller was Freeview with four million devices sold in the last quarter of 2007, which was almost double its 2.4m in the third quarter.

Cable TV also enjoyed a boom.

It added 124,000 homes in the last quarter, which is claimed to be its best performance since 2000.

Cable TV has now overtaken analogue terrestrial viewing to become the third largest platform - behind digital terrestrial and pay satellite - for the first time, with nearly 3.5 million customers and a 13.6% share of the television market.

The launch of the BBC and ITV's new digital satellite TV service Freesat later this year is expected to drive figures up even further.

Ofcom says, however, that the uptake is not only driven by the sale of set-top boxes and cable TV but also a 132% leap in sales of integrated digital televisions (IDTVs).

It says that almost 75% of TVs sold in the fourth quarter of 2007 were IDTVs.

The UK is set to switch over to digital in 2012.