EPG Delivery Formats Explained: XMLTV, JSON, and Custom API Integrations

A fully enriched EPG dataset — complete with synopses, cast data, genre tags, episodic information, imagery references, and technical flags — is only useful if it can be delivered to destination platforms in the format those platforms are built to receive. Behind every programme guide on every television platform in the world, there is a delivery format: a structured technical specification that defines how EPG data is encoded, transmitted, and ingested.

For broadcasters, platform operators, and technical teams working in television metadata, understanding the main EPG delivery formats — XMLTV, JSON, custom XML, and API integration — is essential context for any integration project. This article explains what each format is, when it is used, and what format adaptation involves in practice.

Why EPG Delivery Format Matters

Different platforms are built on different technology stacks. A satellite pay-TV operator running a proprietary set-top box platform may require EPG data in a format that is entirely different from an IPTV operator’s middleware system, which may in turn differ from the schema expected by a streaming app’s content management system.

A metadata provider working with a broadcaster who distributes across ten platforms must therefore maintain the ability to deliver the same underlying data — the same enriched metadata for each programme — in ten potentially different formats, structures, and delivery mechanisms. Format adaptation is a significant operational requirement of professional EPG delivery, and it is one of the primary reasons broadcasters use specialist metadata partners rather than attempting to manage multi-platform delivery from their own teams.

XMLTV: The Industry-Standard EPG Format

XMLTV is an open-standard XML-based format originally developed as part of the XMLTV project — an open-source initiative to create a standard schema for EPG data. It has since been adopted as a widely used standard across the EPG and IPTV industry, supported natively or via adaptation by the majority of IPTV middleware systems and EPG processing tools.

A standard XMLTV file contains channel definitions and a list of programme records. Each programme record typically includes:

• Channel reference
• Start and stop times (in a defined datetime format including timezone offset)
• Programme title (with language attributes)
• Sub-title or episode title
• Programme description
• Category (genre)
• Episode number (in various supported formats, including the xmltv_ns notation and onscreen display format)
• Rating (parental/content advisory)
• Star rating (where applicable)
• Credits block (director, actor, writer)
• Country of production
• Premiere, new, and previously-shown flags
• Subtitles and audio information
• Icon reference (programme image URL or path)

XMLTV’s strengths are its broad support, human readability (as an XML format, it can be inspected and debugged with standard tools), and well-documented structure. Its limitations include finite field support — it was not designed to carry the full range of augmented metadata that modern platforms require — and the need for profile customisation to handle platform-specific requirements beyond the core schema.

Custom XML Schemas

Many larger platforms — particularly tier-1 pay-TV operators and major streaming services — operate bespoke content management or middleware systems with their own proprietary XML schemas. These schemas are designed around the platform’s specific data model and may include field names, structures, and encoding conventions that differ substantially from XMLTV or any other standard.

For metadata providers, delivering to a custom XML schema requires: understanding the full specification document (typically provided by the platform’s technical team), implementing a data transformation process that maps the source metadata fields to the destination schema, validating the output against the platform’s schema specification, and testing the delivered data against the platform’s ingest system before going live.

Custom XML delivery is the norm for large-scale commercial platform integrations, where the operator has invested in a purpose-built metadata infrastructure and requires all data suppliers to conform to its specific requirements.

JSON: The Modern Alternative

JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) is increasingly used as an EPG delivery format, particularly for platforms built on modern web-native or app-based architectures. Its advantages over XML include lighter file weight, easier parsing in JavaScript-based environments, and native compatibility with web APIs and modern content management systems.

JSON EPG delivery is particularly common in:

• OTT streaming apps built on web or React-based frameworks
• Cloud-native platform backends
• API-first architectures where the EPG data is consumed directly by frontend clients via RESTful API calls

As with XML, JSON delivery schemas are typically platform-specific — there is no single universal JSON EPG standard equivalent to XMLTV. Each platform defines its own JSON structure, and metadata providers must implement the corresponding transformation from their source data model.

API-Based EPG Delivery

Beyond batch file delivery (where an XMLTV or JSON file is pushed to a platform at regular intervals), an increasingly important delivery mode is direct API integration. In this model, the platform’s system queries the metadata provider’s API in real time — or at a defined refresh frequency — to retrieve the latest EPG data for the channels it carries.

API-based delivery offers several advantages:

• Near-real-time accuracy: Schedule changes, live event overruns, and last-minute programme additions can be reflected in the platform’s EPG within minutes, rather than waiting for the next scheduled batch delivery window.
• On-demand granularity: The platform can request data for specific channels, specific date ranges, or specific programme records — pulling only what is needed rather than processing a full data file.
• Reduced latency: For platforms with frequent schedule changes or live event coverage, API delivery reduces the gap between a change being made in the metadata system and that change being visible in the viewer’s programme guide.

API delivery requires technical setup from both the metadata provider and the platform: the provider must offer a well-documented, reliable API; the platform must implement the client-side integration. Authentication, error handling, rate limiting, and fallback behaviour all need to be defined and agreed as part of the integration specification.

Format Adaptation: The Hidden Complexity

Behind any multi-platform EPG delivery operation is a continuous process of format adaptation — transforming a single source of enriched metadata into the specific format, schema, structure, and encoding that each destination platform requires.

For a broadcaster distributing to 20 platforms across 10 territories, this may mean maintaining 20 distinct delivery formats or variants. A metadata provider managing this on the broadcaster’s behalf must maintain all 20 transformation pipelines, update them whenever a platform changes its specification, validate each delivery against the current platform schema, and manage the delivery frequency and authentication requirements for every destination simultaneously.

This is an area of genuine operational complexity that is often underestimated by broadcasters who have not previously worked with a specialist metadata partner. The value of outsourcing EPG delivery — beyond the editorial enrichment itself — lies substantially in not having to maintain this multi-platform delivery infrastructure in-house.

Choosing the Right Delivery Model

For platform operators specifying EPG integration requirements, the choice between XMLTV, custom XML, JSON, and API delivery is typically determined by:

• The platform’s technology stack: What formats can the existing middleware or CMS ingest natively?
• Update frequency requirements: How often does the platform’s guide need to be refreshed? Daily batches, several-times-daily updates, or near-real-time?
• Integration investment: Custom schemas and API integrations require more setup time but offer greater control and flexibility.
• Operational resources: Who will manage format maintenance and integration updates? For broadcasters without dedicated metadata engineering teams, a specialist provider that handles format adaptation on their behalf is the practical choice.

The format is ultimately a means to an end: getting accurate, enriched EPG data into the viewer’s programme guide, consistently and reliably, across every platform the broadcaster serves.

Related reading: How EPG Data Gets to Your TV Screen | EPG for IPTV: How Internet Television Manages Programme Guides | What Is an API in TV Broadcasting?

Global Listings delivers EPG metadata in every major format — XMLTV, custom XML, JSON, and direct API — handling full schema adaptation per platform, so broadcasters never need to manage format conversion in-house. Learn more or contact our team.