List of Sacramento Cable channels (November 1990)

Sacramento Cable customers in Sacramento, California had access to the following in November of 1990. In October of 1995, The E. W. Scripps Company, announced its sale of all of its cable television systems including Sacramento Cable to Comcast which wasn't fully completed until mid-late 1997. Today, it operates through Xfinity.

Legend

• CALL — The call letters of an over-the-air television station in bold text.
• CABLE — Cable channels in regular text.
•  ##  — Over-the-air channel number for stations within the Sacramento television market, according to current laws by the FCC and mapping of markets by Nielsen Media Research. Also, some stations may service areas outside of the television market as well.
•  ##  — Over-the-air channel number for distant out-of-market stations, including regional and national "superstations", according to current laws by the FCC and mapping of markets by Nielsen Media Research.
• Network affiliated stations will have the network's logo (of the corresponding era) next to them and independent stations are unmarked.

Market

The Sacramento-Stockton-Modesto television market includes 16 counties in California with market hubs in bold text:

• Counties: Amador, Calaveras, Colusa, El Dorado, Nevada, Placer, Plumas, Sacramento, San Joaquin, Sierra, Solano, Stanislaus, Sutter, Tuolumne, Yolo and Yuba
• Cities: Almanor, Alta Sierra, Angels Camp, Antelope, Arbuckle, Auburn, Beckwourth, Buckhorn, Cedar Vista, Ceres, Chester, Clio, Colusa, Crescent Mills, Davis, Empire, Forbestown, Georgetown, Glenbrook, Grass Valley, Green Valley, Groveland, Elk Grove, Empire, Esparto, Fair Oaks, Folsom, Fremont, Jamestown, Keyes, Lathrop, Lemon Hill, Lincoln Village, Live Oak, Lockeford, Lodi, Loma Rica, Loomis, Loyalton, Meadow Vista, Modesto, Morada, Nevada City, New Jerusalem, Oak Grove, Olivehurst, Orangevale, Parklawn, Pollock Pines, Portola, Quincy, Rancho Cordova, Rancho Murieta, Rio Linda, Rio Vista, Riverbank, Riverview, Rouse, Sacramento, Salida, San Andreas, Sierra City, Spring Garden, Stockton, Tahoe City, Tahoma, Taylorsville, Tracy, Trucklee, Tuolumne, Turlock, Vacaville, Vallecito, Vallejo, Valley Springs, Walnut Grove, West Modesto, Wheatland, Woodland, Yolo and Yuba

Lineup

Broadcast OTA

General Cable†

Premium†

Local/Cable/Public Access

• NOTE: ^†The status of channels at the time of the original publication. Such has likely changed in the years and decades since.

Source: Newspapers.com (Paid subscription to "Publisher Extra" may be required for some sections)

CH#	Name	Notes/Today
2	Music Television (MTV)	Owned by Paramount Global, it has shifted from strictly music and music videos in its early years to a mix of music, reality shows and dramas in recent years
3	3  KCRA-TV Sacramento	Still an NBC affiliate, sister station to MyNetworkTV affiliate  58  KQCA (the former KSCH), owned by Hearst Television
5	Cable News Network	CNN in Atlanta, an American multinational news channel, owned by Warner Bros. Discovery
6	6  KVIE Sacramento	Then and now, still a PBS station (Owned by KVIE, Inc., a non-profit (501(c)3) organization)
7	Video Hits One	Owned by Paramount Global, like its sister network, MTV, VH1 has also shifted from strictly music and music videos in its early years to a mix of music, reality shows and dramas in recent years
8	40  KTXL Sacramento	Still a Fox affiliate, owned today by Nexstar Media Group (The Sacramento Bee erroneously listed KTXL as an independent still by this time, when the station joined Fox in 1986 with the network's launch)
9	ESPN	A 24-hour channel devoted to local, regional, national and international sports (Owned as a joint venture between The Walt Disney Company at 80% and Hearst Communications at 20%)
10	10  KXTV Sacramento	Swapped affiliations with  13  KOVR and has been an ABC affiliate since March of 1995, owned by Tegna Inc.
11	58  KSCH Sacramento	Today a MyNetworkTV affiliate with the call letters KQCA, sister to NBC affiliate  3  KCRA, owned by Hearst Television
12	31  KRBK Sacramento	Today a CW network owned-and-operated with the call letters KMAX-TV (Owned by Paramount Global in a duopoly with CBS O&O  13  KOVR, KMAX to disaffiliate from The CW and become an independent station once again starting in September of 2023)
13	13  KOVR Stockton	Swapped affiliations with  10  KXTV and has been an CBS affiliate since March of 1995 and a network O&O since April of 2005 (Owned by Paramount Global in a duopoly with CW O&O  31  KMAX-TV, the former KRBK)
14	USA Network	Then and now, a general entertainment and sports channel, now owned by NBCUniversal
15	Lifetime	Programming geared towards women and women in lead roles of movies and shows (Owned by A&E Networks, a 50-50 joint venture between Hearst Communications and Disney General Entertainment Content, a division of The Walt Disney Company)
16	The Family Channel	Became Fox Family Channel in 1998 and then ABC Family in 2001 and relaunched as Freeform in 2016
17	17  WTBS Atlanta, GA	The direct feed of the OTA station at the time, now as WPCH-TV, owned by Gray Television, alongside CBS affiliate  46  WANF (then independent as WGNX) and Telemundo affiliate  47  WKTB-CD (Both the station and the TBS network (short for Turner Broadcasting System), were separated from each other in 2007, TBS today, is owned by Warner Bros. Discovery)
18	Turner Network Television	Programming shifted from mostly classic movies towards drama movies and shows over the years with sporting events featured as well, nowadays only by the name TNT, owned by Warner Bros. Discovery
19	19  KCSO Modesto	Still a Univision affiliate and has been network owned-and-operated since 1997 with the call letters KUVS-DT (Owned by TelevisaUnivision as part of a duopoly with UniMás O&O  64  KTFK out of Stockton, then known as independent KFTL, owned by the late Harold Camping)
20	2  KTVU Oakland	Then and now, still a Fox affiliate and an O&O since 2014, owned by Fox Television Stations (Sister station to independent  36  KICU-TV out of San Jose, erroneously listed by the Sacramento Bee as an independent station still by this time)
21	Nickelodeon	Today owned by Paramount Global, schedule then and now, still consists of programming towards children and teenagers up to 18 years of age
	Nick at Nite	Programming initially consisted of 1950s and 1960s shows but shows from later decades added in the years and decades since, owned by Paramount Global
22	36  KICU-TV San Jose	Still an independent, now owned by Fox Television Stations (since 2014) in a duopoly with Fox O&O  2  KTVU
24	9  WGN-TV Chicago, IL	The direct feed of the OTA station at the time, then and now, an independent (Now owned by Nexstar Media Group, its later cable counterpart, WGN America, has since been rebranded and relaunched as NewsNation)
25	9  WWOR Secaucus, NJ	Now a MyNetworkTV O&O, owned by Fox Television Stations in a duopoly with Fox network flagship  5  WNYW in New York City
26	26  KTSF San Francisco	Multicultural (mostly Asian) programming
27	44  KBHK San Francisco	Today a CW network owned-and-operated with the call letters KBCW (Owned by Paramount Global in a duopoly with CBS O&O  5  KPIX-TV, KBCW to become an independent station once again starting in September of 2023)
28	42  KFCB Concord	Today a Tri-State Christian Television (TCT) network O&O with the call letters KTNC
29	CNN Headline News	Once a companion network to CNN with news headlines, programming has shifted mostly to crime and law oriented shows and documentaries in recent years as HLN, owned by Warner Bros. Discovery
30	Educational Access	Status unknown, a local public access channel geared towards scholar and educational interests
31	Showtime	A premium subscription channel with movies, shows, documentaries and sporting events, owned by Paramount Global
32	The Nashville Network (TNN)	A channel once focused on country music and lifestyle, it now operates as a general entertainment channel as Paramount Network, owned by Paramount Global
33	Arts & Entertainment (A&E)	Once a channel focused on arts and history, the channel has shifted significantly towards reality shows, dramas and documentaries, now known only as A&E (The flagship network of A&E Networks, a 50-50 joint venture between Hearst Communications and Disney General Entertainment Content, a division of The Walt Disney Company)
34	Home Box Office	A premium pay subscription network, owned by Warner Bros. Discovery (Home Box Office is still used as the network's legal corporate name, though it operates on-air and online exclusively by the acronym HBO)
35	The Discovery Channel	Still operates today with a program mix of technology, science, nature and reality, and its name shortened to just Discovery (also occasionally known as Discovery Channel), owned by Warner Bros. Discovery
36	The Weather Channel	Weather forecasting and science and in recent years, weather related shows and documentaries as well (Also with local weather alerts and local forecasts every ten minutes on the 8s of every hour, owned by Entertainment Studios)
37	Cinemax	Sister and companion network to HBO, owned by Warner Bros. Discovery (A premium pay subscription channel with mainstream, independent and original shows, movies and documentaries)
38	The Disney Channel	Originally a premium pay subscription channel, Disney is now a general cable channel
39	Financial News Network	Financial, consumer and business news and stocks, sold to NBC and absorbed/integrated into CNBC in 1991
	FNN Score	Sports programming from 6:00 pm to 1:00 am (Eastern Time) Weeknights (1985-1988) and 12:00 pm to 1:00 am on Weekends (1988-1991), shut down after NBC began integrating FNN into CNBC in 1991
40	The Movie Channel	A premium pay subscription channel with classic, mainstream and independent movies (Sister and companion network to Showtime, owned by Paramount Global)
42	Bravo	Originally focused on film and performing arts (as a premium pay subscription channel), the channel has shifted towards lifestyle and reality shows as well as programming themed around the LGBTQ community (as a general cable channel), owned by NBCUniversal
43	Black Entertainment Television	Then and now, still carries programming heavily targeting African-American audiences, though it nowadays goes only by the acronym BET, owned by Paramount Global
44	The Playboy Channel	Today known as Playboy TV, though still a premium pay subscription channel focused entirely on adult erotica and pornography
46	Country Music Television	Programming consisting of country music and lifestyle with some country-themed reality shows added in recent years, now known only as CMT, owned by Paramount Global
47	Community Access	Still operates today as Access Sacramento on Comcast channels 17 and 18, with a companion low-power radio station, KUBU-LP at 96.5 FM
48	American Movie Classics	Nowadays known only as AMC, it has shifted from originally exclusively classic movies (as a pay channel) towards movies, shows and original programming (as a general cable channel), owned by AMC Networks
62	SportsChannel Bay Area	Then and now, still a local and regional sports channel (originally by pay subscription), now a general cable channel, sold to Fox Sports and again to Comcast, now as NBC Sports Bay Area
66	KVIE-Cable	Today operates as KVIE2, a secondary subchannel of KVIE
67	Telemundo	A Spanish network owned by NBCUniversal, local affiliates and future O&Os KCSO-LD, KMUM-CD, and KMMW-LD, all on  33 , were NOT yet on the air at the time
68	C-SPAN	A channel entirely focused on federal government and public affairs pertaining to the United States House of Representatives, including live coverage of proceedings
69	C-SPAN2	A channel entirely focused on federal government and public affairs pertaining to the United States Senate, including live coverage of proceedings