Editing ITV Digital Channels (section)

===2004–present: ITV plc control and multichannel expansion===
On 1 November 2004, ITV plc agreed to purchase BSkyB's stake in GSkyB for £10 million. The deal included the slot that [[Plus (British TV channel)|Granada Plus]] was broadcasting on, which ITV used to broadcast its new [[ITV3]] channel which replaced Plus on the same day.<ref name="ITV3">{{cite press release|title=ITV3 to launch on satellite today|publisher=[[ITV plc]]|date=1 November 2004|url=http://www.itvplc.com/itv/news/releases/pr2004/2004-11-01/|access-date=16 November 2006|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061015171022/http://www.itvplc.com/itv/news/releases/pr2004/2004-11-01/|archive-date=15 October 2006|url-status=dead}}</ref> The negotiations that led to ITV plc taking sole control of GSkyB, closing Plus and launching ITV3 on digital satellite were apparently completed just hours before the new channel started broadcasting. On 8 November, Granada Sky Broadcasting was renamed ITV Digital Channels Limited, shortly after the closure of Granada Plus left [[Men & Motors]] as the sole survivor of the original four channels. As part of ITV's buy-out of Sky's shareholding, Sky would have received 49.5% of any proceeds (net of liabilities) from any future sale of Men & Motors.<ref name="ITV3" /> The newly renamed company was given the brief of running all of ITV's digital services, with the major difference from the former GSkyB operation being that its channels were now [[free-to-air]] and carried the ITV brand. 

On 2 May 2005, Men & Motors launched as a free-to-air channel on the [[Freeview (UK)|Freeview]] [[Digital terrestrial television in the United Kingdom|digital terrestrial television]] service. It was rumoured that ITV plc would replace it with [[ITV4]], another men's channel, when it launched later that year on 1 November, echoing the launch of ITV3 in 2004. However, after better than expected performance from Men & Motors as a free-to-air channel, both channels continued and ITV plc cut the hours of the [[ITV News Channel]] to make way for ITV4 and [[CITV]] instead. The news channel closed on 23 December of that year with its remaining bandwidth used for CITV.

Although ITV4 started broadcasting from the [[SES Astra|Astra]] satellite on 1 November, it was not placed on the Sky [[Electronic program guide|EPG]] until 7 November. Because of this, some ITV4 sports programming was [[simulcast]] on Men & Motors under the ''ITV4 on m&m'' strand. On 23 February 2006, despite the previous decision not to close Men & Motors, fresh rumours over the channel's future began to circulate due to poorer than expected performance from ITV4.<ref>
{{cite news|last=Wilkes|first=Neil|title=ITV "not happy" with ITV4 ratings|publisher=[[Digital Spy]]|date=23 February 2006|url=http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/article/ds29521.html|access-date=16 November 2006}}
</ref> In April 2006, Men & Motors left Freeview to make way for the launch of [[ITV Play]], and much of its content was moved over to ITV4. ITV intended to dispose of the channel as a non-core asset, but it ultimately closed on [[Virgin Media]] on 25 March 2010, and finally closed on Sky and [[Freesat]] on 1 April, to make way for a permanent EPG position for [[ITV1 HD|ITV HD]].

In 2014, ITV's portfolio of channels was expanded with the launch of [[ITV Encore]], a drama channel, and [[ITVBe]], a reality and lifestyle channel. The launch of the latter lead to ITV2's repositioning as a youth-focused entertainment channel. In 2018, ITV closed the Encore channel and repositioned its content to the ITV Hub online service. In 2021, commissions for ITV2, ITVBe and CITV were altered in that they would debut first on the ITV Hub, then on the linear channels, whilst ITV2 was given a wider brief for producing factual content.

The CITV channel closed on 1 September 2023, with programming moved to streaming service [[ITVX]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/66570523|title=CITV channel to close as ITVX Kids streaming service launches|date=22 August 2023|website=BBC News}}</ref> A daily programming block was introduced on ITV2 from 2 September 2023, from 05:00 to 09:00, using the "CITV" brand.