ABC Family Sets Date for Freeform Name Change

ABC Family announced the date of the network’s rebranding on Thursday.

The network will officially become Freeform on Tuesday, Jan. 12, the day of the series premiere of “Shadowhunters” and return of the hit “Pretty Little Liars.”

The following weeks will see the midseason premiere of “The Fosters” and the series premiere of “Recovery Road” on Jan. 25. Comedies “Young & Hungry” and “Baby Daddy” will premiere Feb. 3.

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“The Freeform brand represents the passion, fun, energy and new ideas that infuse young adulthood,” said ABC Family President Tom Ascheim. “We’ve been evolving naturally for a while now, so it’s time that our name reflects the true essence of our brand. We are excited to take our network in some new directions and continue to evolve alongside culture while delivering those favorite shows our viewers already love.”

The name change, first announced in October, is a continuation of the network’s focus on a core audience made up of viewers age 14-34, a group dubbed, “becomers.”

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“We looked for a name that would do three things for us,” Ascheim explained to TheWrap at the time of the announcement. “One was to evoke this idea of becomers, this idea that these people are in formation. Two, we wanted to mandate this moment in media and capture this sense that content oozes from platform to platform and screen to screen. And then lastly we just wanted a name that made you feel something and hopefully feel something positive.”

Freeform will replace ABC Family on all channel line-ups; its channel number will not change.