CJCH-TV first went on the air on January 1, 1961 as an independent station, and it became one of the original CTV stations when the network began operations on October 1, 1961. CHUM Limited sold CJCH-TV along with ATV and the Atlantic Satellite Network to Baton Broadcasting on February 26, 1997, but kept CJCH radio. CTVglobemedia's acquisition of CHUM Limited on June 22, 2007 brought CJCH-TV and CJCH radio back under common ownership.
As of May 12, 2011, the HD signal of CJCH is available on Eastlink. It became available on Bell TV via channel 1011 as of September 12, 2011, Bell Aliant TV in early 2012, and Shaw Direct on May 29, 2013. The station ceased broadcasting in analogue on August 31, 2011 and began broadcasting in digital on the same date.
* The Bridgetown transmitter was among a long list of CTV rebroadcasters nationwide to shut down on or before August 31, 2009, as part of a political dispute with Canadian authorities on paid fee-for-carriage requirements for cable television operators. A subsequent change in ownership assigned full control of CTVglobemedia to Bell Canada; as of 2011, these transmitters remain in normal licensed broadcast operation. On February 11, 2016, Bell Media applied for its regular license renewals, which included applications to delete a long list of transmitters, including CJCH-TV-2 and CJCH-TV-8. Bell Media's rationale for deleting these analog repeaters is below:
"We are electing to delete these analog transmitters from the main licence with which they are associated. These analog transmitters generate no incremental revenue, attract little to no viewership given the growth of BDU or DTH subscriptions and are costly to maintain, repair or replace. In addition, none of the highlighted transmitters offer any programming that differs from the main channels. The Commission has determined that broadcasters may elect to shut down transmitters but will lose certain regulatory privileges as noted in Broadcasting Regulatory Policy CRTC 2015–24, Over-the-air transmission of television signals and local programming. We are fully aware of the loss of these regulatory privileges as a result of any transmitter shutdown."
At the same time, Bell Media applied to convert the licenses of CTV 2 Atlantic and CTV 2 Alberta from satellite-to-cable undertakings into television stations without transmitters, and to reduce the level of educational content on CTV 2 Alberta. On July 30, 2019, Bell Media was granted permission to close down two additional transmitters as part of Broadcasting Decision CRTC 2019-268. The transmitters for CJCH-TV-3 and CJCH-TV-4 will be shut down by December 3, 2021.
