The late-night dilemma: Balancing tradition and disruption

Two competing opinions landed in my inbox recently, both signalling a shift in late-night entertainment, but from entirely different perspectives. The first, from RainNews, argued that podcasts were replacing traditional late-night TV. The second, from Like & Subscribe, claimed that YouTube shows were the true successors. Both followed the abrupt cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, ostensibly for ‘purely financial reasons’. Yet the timing – given Colbert’s outspoken criticism of the Trump administration – raises eyebrows.

The maths seems simple. TV is expensive. YouTube is economical. Video podcasts are more economical still. However, this goes deeper than financial calculations, it's about what happens when we mistake disruption for replacement. While digital alternatives thrive, they do not necessarily replicate what made late-night TV matter in the first place.

The cost crunch and the rise of alternatives

There is no denying the financial pressures facing traditional TV. Broadcast budgets are strained by declining linear ad-revenue, inflated production costs, and fragmented viewership. Meanwhile, YouTube creators and podcasters operate with leaner teams, faster turnarounds, and direct audience relationship, allowing them to thrive where legacy TV stumbles.

The success of shows like Chicken Shop Date or Hot Ones illustrate younger audiences’ appetite for authenticity and spontaneity, qualities that rigid, traditional formats sometimes lack. Similarly, podcasts have thrived by offering long-form, informal and unfiltered conversations that TV simply cannot replicate at scale.

So, does this mean TV’s late-night era is over? Not quite.

The cultural role of linear late night

While digital alternatives are flourishing, they serve a different audience and function. YouTube and podcasts dominate among Gen Z and younger millennials, but linear TV still holds sway with older demographics (35+). Late-night TV offers a curated, professionally produced experience that provides comfort, consistency, and a shared cultural moment in an otherwise fragmented media landscape.

MIDiA’s report, ‘International success for local language artists’, demonstrated that late-night still has the power to drive cultural relevance, most notably when Bad Bunny showcased his Puerto Rican parranda on Jimmy Kimmel Live, which subsequently boosted his streaming numbers. To claim late-night is no longer part of the zeitgeist is to overlook these dynamics entirely.

Finally, there’s its political and societal value. Barely hidden by the so-called budget cuts is an uncomfortable truth: late-night remains one of the few mass platforms that speak truth to power. It bridges entertainment and journalism, delivering satire, political critique, and cultural commentary in a way newer mediums do not.  Where digital creators excel in niche, personality-driven content, television still brings mass appeal and institutional credibility. It can push beyond algorithmic echo chambers and expose mainstream audiences to new perspectives, rather than reinforcing existing ones. This is the essence of its enduring social role.

The future of late night is evolution, not extinction

The mistake is not in recognising the growth of digital alternatives, it’s in prematurely declaring TV obsolete. Media rarely dies outright; it adapts. Late-night TV doesn’t need to disappear, it needs to evolve. Television would benefit greatly from becoming more agile.

Could late night thrive with a hybrid model – shorter linear broadcasts supplemented by digital-exclusive segments? Could networks leverage YouTube and podcast extensions to reach younger audiences without abandoning their core demo? Or is it really just a Blockbuster Kisok inside a Tower Records?

The answer is more optimistic than that. It is premature and strategically narrow to anoint a single successor to television. The media landscape is fragmenting, not consolidating. Rather than writing off late-night as outdated, networks should reassess its economics, rethink distribution, and reimagine its role across platforms. Colbert’s cancellation may yield short-term savings, but it risks discarding the long-term value of a format that still holds cultural weight.

There is still a place for traditional late-night TV; it just needs to be more agile.

Paramount and CBS should reinstate Colbert, but with a multiplatform strategy built for today’s audience habits. The values of late night need to be retained above all – regardless of format. The future of late-night isn’t about replacement, it’s about reinvention.