What's on TV tonight Monday 18 May 2026? Mondays do not usually get to be the biggest night of the sporting calendar, but this one is different. Arsenal host already-relegated Burnley at the Emirates at 8pm, and a win puts them where they have not been in 22 years: Premier League champions. The Invincibles season -- 2003-04, 49 unbeaten games, a golden trophy, the story that never quite ended because it never had to -- is the comparison that hangs over this club every May they come close. Tonight they are close enough to touch it. Sky Sports Main Event has the match, coverage from 6.30pm, and if you have followed this Premier League season you will not need persuading to be in front of it.
After the final whistle, or perhaps alongside it if you have multiple screens and no shame about that, the serious Monday-night television gets under way. Lucy Worsley is on BBC Two at 9pm with the UK premiere of "Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution" -- Episode 1 of 2, tied to the 250th anniversary of US independence and described in her own framing as a tale of absolute mutual incomprehension. The production went to PBS first in the US in April, which tells you something about the scale of the commission. It is the RT cover pick for tonight and it earns it. Meanwhile on ITV1 at 9pm, Jeff Pope's Believe Me reaches its finale -- Episode 4, in which John Worboys is granted parole and three survivor women, led by Miriam Petche's Carrie Symonds, demand a judicial review. This is serious drama and it lands tonight.
Browse what's on right now for live updates, check tonight's highlights, or head to the full channels list including dedicated pages for BBC One, BBC Two, BBC Four, ITV1, Channel 5, Channel 4, Sky Sports Main Event, Sky Sports Premier League, Sky Atlantic, and More4. Yesterday's TV guide covers The Cage Episode 4 and the Women's Six Nations Grand Slam decider: see our Sunday 17 May 2026 TV guide.
What's on TV tonight: quick picks
- "Football: Arsenal v Burnley" -- Sky Sports Main Event + Sky Sports Premier League, coverage 6.30pm (k/o 8pm) -- TITLE DECIDER; Arsenal can clinch first PL title in 22 years; Emirates Stadium; Burnley relegated; moved from Sunday for Sky live broadcast
- "Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution" -- BBC Two, 9pm -- EPISODE 1 OF 2; UK PREMIERE; 250th anniversary; "The Breakup"; Benjamin Franklin; King George III; rebel statue; both episodes on iPlayer; RT COVER PICK
- Believe Me -- ITV1, 9pm -- SERIES FINALE (Episode 4 of 4); Jeff Pope true-crime; Daniel Mays as Worboys; Miriam Petche as Carrie Johnson; judicial review; Aimée-Ffion Edwards; Aasiya Shah; Met Police humiliated
- RHS Chelsea Flower Show -- BBC One, 2pm (Nicki Chapman + Angellica Bell) / BBC Two, 8pm (Monty Don + Rachel de Thame) -- PRESS DAY; Royal Visit; King's Foundation Curious Garden (David Beckham + Alan Titchmarsh); public opens Tuesday 19 May
- Great Continental Railway Journeys -- BBC Two, 6.30pm -- SERIES 9 PREMIERE; Michael Portillo; Sardinia + Corsica; Porto Flavia; Eleonora d'Arborea
- Canal Boat Diaries -- U&Yesterday, 7pm + 8pm -- SERIES 7 PREMIERE double bill; Robbie Cumming; Naughty Lass; Wales to West Yorkshire; Pontcysyllte Aqueduct; Llangollen Canal
- The Family Next Door -- ITV1, 10.45pm + 11.40pm -- Episodes 3 + 4 double bill; Teresa Palmer; Maria Angelico as Lulu; Jane Harber as Fran; Bob Morley; Australian psychological thriller
- "This Is a Bomb: The Nevada Casino Heist" -- BBC Two, 11pm -- FINALE; John Birges; August 1980; Lake Tahoe; Harvey's Resort Casino; FBI controlled explosion
- Euphoria -- Sky Atlantic, 9pm (prime-time repeat; first UK airing 2am) -- Series 3, Episode 6 "Stand Still and See"; FINAL SEASON; Zendaya; Jacob Elordi; Sydney Sweeney
- Our Tiny Islands -- More4, 9pm -- Series 2; Joanne the sheep farmer; Iona; Scottish island life
- Pointless -- BBC One, 5.15pm -- Alexander Armstrong + Susan Wokoma; Series 35
See what's on right now for live updates.
Tonight's TV schedule: full listings
| Time | Channel | Programme |
|---|---|---|
| ~2pm | BBC One | RHS Chelsea Flower Show daytime coverage -- Nicki Chapman; Angellica Bell; Press Day; Royal Visit |
| 2.50pm | Sky Sports Cricket | "Cricket: IPL" coverage -- CSK v SRH Match 63; MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai |
| 3pm | Sky Sports Cricket | "Cricket: IPL" Chennai Super Kings v Sunrisers Hyderabad KICK-OFF -- Match 63; 7:30pm IST |
| 5.15pm | BBC One | Pointless Series 35 -- Alexander Armstrong; Susan Wokoma co-host |
| 6.30pm | BBC Two | Great Continental Railway Journeys S9 E1 SERIES PREMIERE -- Michael Portillo; Sardinia + Corsica; Porto Flavia; Eleonora d'Arborea |
| 6.30pm | Sky Sports Main Event | "Football: Arsenal v Burnley" coverage -- Arsenal title decider; coverage start |
| 7.00pm | U&Yesterday | Canal Boat Diaries S7 E1 SERIES PREMIERE -- Robbie Cumming; Naughty Lass; Wales to West Yorkshire; Llangollen Canal |
| 8.00pm | BBC Two | RHS Chelsea Flower Show evening coverage -- Monty Don; Rachel de Thame; Press Day highlights; Royal Visit |
| 8.00pm | U&Yesterday | Canal Boat Diaries S7 E2 -- Pontcysyllte Aqueduct; Welsh lamb pasties; fiendish locks |
| 8.00pm | ITV1 | Emmerdale -- Charity Dingle vs Dr Todd blackmail; Ross Barton baby secret; Mackenzie; £10,000 demand |
| 8pm (k/o) | Sky Sports Main Event + Sky Sports PL | "Football: Arsenal v Burnley" KICK-OFF LIVE -- TITLE DECIDER; Emirates Stadium; Burnley relegated; Arsenal seek first title since 2003-04 Invincibles |
| 9.00pm | BBC Two | "Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution" Ep 1 of 2 -- UK PREMIERE; "The Breakup"; 250th anniversary; Benjamin Franklin; King George III; both eps on iPlayer; RT COVER PICK |
| 9.00pm | ITV1 | Believe Me Episode 4 of 4 SERIES FINALE -- Daniel Mays as Worboys; Miriam Petche as Carrie Johnson; judicial review; Jeff Pope; all eps on ITVX |
| 9.00pm | More4 | Our Tiny Islands Series 2 -- Joanne the sheep farmer; Iona; Scottish island life |
| 9.00pm | Sky Atlantic | Euphoria S3 E6 "Stand Still and See" (prime-time repeat; first UK airing 2am) -- FINAL SEASON; Zendaya; Jacob Elordi; Sydney Sweeney |
| 10.45pm | ITV1 | The Family Next Door Episode 3 "Lulu" -- Teresa Palmer; Maria Angelico; Philippa Northeast; Australian thriller |
| 11.00pm | BBC Two | "This Is a Bomb: The Nevada Casino Heist" FINALE -- John Birges; August 1980 Lake Tahoe; Harvey's Resort Casino; FBI |
| 11.00pm | TNT Sports 1 | "Baseball: MLB" coverage -- Detroit Tigers v Cleveland Guardians; Comerica Park |
| ~11.40pm | TNT Sports 1 | "Baseball: MLB" Detroit Tigers v Cleveland Guardians FIRST PITCH -- Comerica Park, Detroit; 4-game series opener |
| 11.40pm | ITV1 | The Family Next Door Episode 4 "Fran" -- Jane Harber as Fran; Bob Morley; husband's depression; confidential files |
| 2.00am | Sky Atlantic | Euphoria S3 E6 "Stand Still and See" FIRST UK AIRING -- simulcast with US; final season |
| Now streaming | Netflix | Berlin and the Lady with an Ermine -- all 8 episodes; Money Heist spin-off; Pedro Alonso as Berlin; dropped Friday 15 May |
| Now streaming | Prime Video | Good Omens Series 3 -- David Tennant; Michael Sheen; all 6 episodes from Wednesday 13 May |
| Now streaming | BBC iPlayer | The Cage (all 5 episodes) -- catch up before the series finale, Sunday 24 May at 9pm BBC One |
Arsenal v Burnley -- Sky Sports Main Event + Sky Sports Premier League, k/o 8pm
Arsenal v Burnley is live on Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League on Monday 18 May 2026. Coverage begins at 6.30pm; kick-off at 8pm BST at the Emirates Stadium. Arsenal can clinch their first Premier League title in 22 years. Coverage: Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League.
It has been 22 years. The Invincibles, the golden trophy, the 49-game unbeaten run -- Arsenal's last league championship was the 2003-04 season, and it has occupied the mythology of that club ever since in the way that great seasons do when they keep not being repeated. Thierry Henry, Patrick Vieira, Robert Pires, Ashley Cole, that red and white, that particular shade of invincibility. Twenty-two years is long enough for a generation of supporters to have grown up and had children who are now old enough to understand what they are watching.
Tonight, at the Emirates, it could end. Arsenal host already-relegated Burnley in their final home game of the 2025-26 season, and a win puts them on the winning post. The match was moved from Sunday 17 May to Monday 18 May for live broadcast by Sky Sports -- a decision that drew displeasure from the Arsenal Supporters' Trust, who noted the clear difficulties an 8pm Monday kick-off creates for travelling and working supporters. That is a legitimate concern. It does not make the match any less significant.
The situation
Burnley are already down. They come to the Emirates without anything to play for in the table, which can cut both ways in football -- a side with the season effectively written can play with a freedom that is occasionally dangerous, or they can simply not play at all. Arsenal will have done their analysis and made their peace with whatever Burnley bring. The Emirates will be full. The atmosphere, on a night where a title could be won, will be everything a Premier League stadium can produce.
Sky Sports has the match from 6.30pm, which gives you an hour and a half of build-up, and on a night of this potential significance the build-up will be worth watching. The analysis, the footage, the interviews, the assembled anticipation -- this is the occasion television that Sky Sports does better than anyone else in English football. Watch the whole thing. If Arsenal win, you will want to have seen every moment of it.
On Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League. Coverage from 6.30pm; kick-off 8pm.
"Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution" -- BBC Two, 9pm
"Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution," Episode 1 of 2 ("The Breakup"), airs on BBC Two at 9pm on Monday 18 May 2026. UK premiere. The two-part documentary first aired on PBS in the United States in April 2026. Both episodes are on BBC iPlayer.
Two hundred and fifty years since the Declaration of Independence, and Lucy Worsley wants to know how Britain managed to lose a whole continent while apparently not quite understanding what was happening. The answer she arrives at, and the frame she puts around the entire American Revolution, is the one that historians have circled for decades without quite putting it this personally: this was a divorce. Not a clean political rupture by people who had run out of arguments, but a marriage breakdown -- two sides speaking the same language in completely different emotional registers, each convinced the other must see what is obvious, each discovering that they do not, both eventually saying things that cannot be unsaid.
Lucy Worsley is one of the BBC's best on-screen historians precisely because she does not treat history as a set of facts to be delivered at the camera. She treats it as a set of human situations to be understood from the inside, and she has a particular gift for finding the vivid, specific, slightly eccentric detail that unlocks the larger story. Tonight's first episode, "The Breakup," is full of those details.
The King, the radical, and the rebel statue
King George III's position: "We must master them" -- a line that captures exactly the failure of imagination that made the separation inevitable. George was not a tyrant in the mode that American mythology would later require him to be; he was a man who genuinely could not conceive that the relationship could end, which made the end inevitable once the other party had decided. Worsley uses this framing well.
Benjamin Franklin's naked air baths -- his habit of sitting before an open window in a state of undress each morning, believing the fresh air was medicinal -- are the sort of biographical detail that Worsley deploys with genuine delight. Franklin was in Paris on a secret diplomatic mission; his peculiarities and his genius were in constant operation simultaneously. The story of how Britain's most famous colonial lost faith in the project he had spent a lifetime championing is one of the emotional centres of Episode 1.
The production travels to New York's City Hall Park, where Washington's troops heard the Declaration of Independence read aloud to them in July 1776, and then tore down the equestrian statue of King George III standing nearby. The statue was melted into musket balls -- an image of transformation that Episode 1 makes central to its account of what the revolution actually felt like in the bodies of the people involved.
Radical British politics enters the picture through John Wilkes -- the troublemaking MP whose opposition to the government made him a hero to American colonists and whose Wilkes-themed crockery decorated the shelves of people in Boston who saw him as a kindred spirit. The British dimension of the American Revolution is consistently underplayed in English-language television documentary; Worsley brings it back.
The second episode
"A Messy Divorce" airs on BBC Two on Monday 25 May. Both episodes are on BBC iPlayer from tonight.
On BBC Two at 9pm. This is the RT cover pick for Monday 18 May and it is easy to see why: it is exactly the programme that BBC Two's Monday 9pm slot exists to carry.
Believe Me -- ITV1, 9pm
Believe Me, Episode 4 of 4 -- the series finale -- airs on ITV1 at 9pm on Monday 18 May 2026. Jeff Pope MBE's true-crime drama about the John Worboys case. Daniel Mays as Worboys. Miriam Petche as Carrie Symonds (later Carrie Johnson). The series is directed by Julia Ford. All four episodes are on ITVX.
Jeff Pope has spent a career making ITV dramas about the things that really happened that are too uncomfortable to look at straight on and too important to look away from. Philomena. Mrs Biggs. Little Boy Blue. His approach is patient, grounded, and relentlessly focused on the human cost rather than the mechanics. Believe Me is his account of the John Worboys case -- the Black Cab rapist who attacked more than 100 women over a period of years while the Metropolitan Police repeatedly failed to connect the evidence they had -- and it is one of the year's most significant pieces of television.
Daniel Mays plays Worboys, but the drama is not about him. Pope has structured the series from three points of view: Aimée-Ffion Edwards as Sarah, Aasiya Shah as Laila, and Miriam Petche as Carrie Symonds. The centre of gravity stays with the survivors throughout, which is the correct artistic decision and also a political one.
Carrie Symonds / Carrie Johnson
Carrie Symonds -- now Carrie Johnson, having married Boris Johnson in 2021 -- was attacked by Worboys in 2007. She was 19 years old. Worboys drove her home from a nightclub on the King's Road and offered her champagne that she believed was spiked; she became ill and passed out. She was one of 14 women who testified at Worboys' trial. She waived her right to anonymity to speak publicly. She joined the Conservative Party professionally in 2009 -- after the attack, not before -- and later rose to become head of party communications. The drama is set in the years from the attack through the subsequent legal battles; her political career is context, not character.
The detail that Miriam Petche's performance carries in the finale is what Carrie did a decade after the original trial: when the Parole Board ruled in 2018 that Worboys should be released, Carrie Symonds was among the women who fought back. She was involved in fundraising for the successful judicial review that quashed the Parole Board's decision. Tonight's finale dramatises that fight. The Met Police is humiliated. The three women who were told for years that they were wrong, mistaken, confused, or lying, turn out to have been completely right. The drama was developed with Carrie Johnson's involvement over a long period, which gives the portrayal a different weight.
Episode 4 on ITV1 at 9pm. All four episodes on ITVX.
RHS Chelsea Flower Show -- BBC One 2pm / BBC Two 8pm
Monday 18 May 2026 is Press Day at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show -- the day before the public show opens on Tuesday 19 May. BBC One carries daytime coverage from approximately 2pm with Nicki Chapman and Angellica Bell. BBC Two airs evening highlights at 8pm with Monty Don and Rachel de Thame. The public show runs Tuesday 19 May to Saturday 23 May.
Chelsea Flower Show week is one of those events that British television covers with a completeness that makes it feel less like a gardening programme and more like a state occasion. The BBC has been doing this for decades, and it shows: the coverage is structured, relaxed, warm, and deeply knowledgeable without being exclusionary. Monday is Press Day, which is the day serious gardeners and broadcasters consider the most interesting: the showground is immaculate, the designers are nervous, the Royal Visit is incoming, and the performance element of the public show has not yet settled into the relaxed showmanship of Wednesday and Thursday.
The daytime coverage
Nicki Chapman and Angellica Bell front BBC One's daytime coverage from approximately 2pm -- a point worth clarifying, since Sophie Raworth presented Sunday's launch programme (17 May) and some listings have carried her name forward into Monday. The confirmed Monday daytime leads are Chapman and Bell, with practical gardening tips, show preview material, and coverage of the press day preparations.
The evening coverage
Monty Don leads the BBC Two 8pm evening coverage, with Rachel de Thame alongside him for the early part of the week. Carol Klein, Adam Frost, and Jamie Butterworth also contribute across the week. The evening programmes run the showground in a more reflective register: individual gardens profiled in depth, the horticultural context provided, the designers given space to explain what they were trying to do.
The King's Foundation Curious Garden
The most-discussed garden of the 2026 show, based on advance press, is The King's Foundation Curious Garden -- a project involving Alan Titchmarsh and David Beckham alongside the Royal Foundation. King Charles III's Foundation has been involved in garden projects at Chelsea before; this year's collaboration with Beckham and Titchmarsh is the combination that the press previews have found most compelling. The details of the specific garden design and installation are, as of writing, the subject of Press Day itself -- watch the BBC coverage from 2pm for the first proper look.
BBC One daytime from ~2pm; BBC Two evening at 8pm. On BBC One and BBC Two.
Great Continental Railway Journeys -- BBC Two, 6.30pm
Great Continental Railway Journeys Series 9 premieres on BBC Two at 6.30pm on Monday 18 May 2026. Michael Portillo begins Episode 1 in Sardinia and Corsica. 15 episodes; on BBC Two and iPlayer.
Michael Portillo's railway travel series has been going long enough that it has acquired the quality of a reliable institution: you know what you are getting, which is Portillo in a vivid jacket, a copy of Bradshaw in hand, somewhere in Europe that British television rarely visits, doing something unexpected and being genuinely interested in it. Series 9 opens in Sardinia and Corsica, which is as good a beginning as the series has had in several runs.
Sardinia: Eleonora d'Arborea and Porto Flavia
Episode 1's Sardinian section takes Portillo to Cagliari and the legacy of Eleonora d'Arborea (around 1340-1404) -- the Giudicessa of Arborea who created the Carta de Logu, one of the earliest legal codes in European history. She is the Sardinian figure who appears on monuments and in civic pride with a consistency that surprises visitors who did not know about her. Portillo's itinerary appears to include archival material and a visit that contextualises how her memory operates in contemporary Sardinia.
The other set piece in Episode 1 is Porto Flavia, the mining facility built into the Sardinian cliffs in the 1920s. The loading structure is tunnelled through the cliff face and suspended over the sea at height -- an extraordinary piece of industrial architecture that looks like something from a different era of engineering ambition entirely. As a travel television destination it works on multiple levels: the visual drama, the history, and the fact that most viewers will never have heard of it.
Series 9 continues through Belgium (Brussels, Flanders, Wallonia, the Ardennes) and Hungary (the Austrian border to Budapest and the Great Plain). On BBC Two at 6.30pm.
Canal Boat Diaries -- U&Yesterday, 7pm + 8pm
Canal Boat Diaries Series 7 launches on U&Yesterday with a double bill at 7pm and 8pm on Monday 18 May 2026. Robbie Cumming and narrowboat Naughty Lass travel a brand-new route from Wales to West Yorkshire -- Robbie's first voyage to Wales by narrowboat in ten years of life aboard. 10 episodes; on U&Yesterday and U streaming.
Canal Boat Diaries is exactly what it sounds like and entirely what it sets out to be: unhurried, warm, slightly obsessive about locks and waterways geography, and animated by Robbie Cumming's quiet pleasure in the life he has chosen. Series 7 gives him a new route -- Wales to West Yorkshire -- that brings him to country he has not navigated before.
The Welsh section takes the Llangollen Canal, which carries its destination in its name: Llangollen, in north-east Wales, at the edge of the Dee Valley. The canal was built in the late 18th century as an arm of the Ellesmere Canal and it leads, eventually, to the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct -- 313 metres long, 38 metres high, the world's longest and highest navigable aqueduct, a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2009, and one of the most extraordinary things you can travel across in a narrowboat. Thomas Telford built it; it took ten years; it carries you in a cast-iron trough over a valley in a way that requires a period of adjustment before it becomes normal.
The first episode also features Welsh lamb and leek pasties -- oggies, as they are known in this part of the world -- a detail the series handles with the lightness it deserves.
Double bill: Episodes 1 and 2 on U&Yesterday at 7pm and 8pm. Available on U streaming.
Believe Me -- the full story so far
For anyone coming to tonight's finale without having seen Episodes 1-3: the series is available in full on ITVX. The brief version is this. John Worboys -- the Black Cab rapist -- attacked over 100 women using a standard method: offering drinks laced with a sedative, claiming to have won money at a casino, presenting himself as harmless. The Metropolitan Police received multiple reports from women over several years and failed to connect them, failed to act on them, or treated complainants with a scepticism that amounted to dismissal.
Three women, in Jeff Pope's account, became the human centre of the story: Sarah (Aimée-Ffion Edwards), who reported to the police and was repeatedly disbelieved; Laila (Aasiya Shah), who had her own journey through the same wall of institutional indifference; and Carrie Symonds (Miriam Petche), whose attack in 2007 and subsequent role in the judicial review campaign are told in the finale. Worboys was eventually arrested, convicted in 2009, and sentenced to an indefinite term. Nine years later, the Parole Board recommended his release. The response from survivors is what Episode 4 covers.
The Family Next Door -- ITV1, 10.45pm + 11.40pm
The Family Next Door airs on ITV1 tonight in a double bill: Episode 3 "Lulu" at 10.45pm and Episode 4 "Fran" at 11.40pm. Australian psychological thriller based on the novel by Sally Hepworth. Teresa Palmer as Isabelle, Bella Heathcote as Ange. Note: all six episodes have been on ITVX since 21 December 2025; these are the linear ITV1 broadcasts.
Sally Hepworth's novel is built on a structural device that works better in television than it does in most literary fiction: each chapter belongs to a different character, which means your understanding of the shared situation keeps shifting as the point of view rotates. The series has followed this structure, with each episode named for its focal character.
Episode 3, "Lulu," focuses on Maria Angelico's Lulu and Philippa Northeast's Holly -- a couple whose parenting choices come under pressure just as Teresa Palmer's Isabelle, the unsettling investigator at the centre of the series, starts to zero in on Lulu and her daughter Elvis. There is something about the way Isabelle moves through this neighbourhood, gathering information with a warmth that does not quite reach her eyes, that gives the series its particular unease.
Episode 4, "Fran," shifts to Jane Harber's Fran, a lawyer struggling with her husband's (Bob Morley) depression, who finds herself manoeuvred into a position where Isabelle can leverage her guilt to access confidential files. The episode is about complicity -- how a reasonable person ends up doing something unreasonable through small increments -- which is the territory this series inhabits with some skill.
Teresa Palmer and Bella Heathcote anchor the series across all six episodes. If you want to catch up from the beginning, all six episodes are on ITVX. On ITV1 from 10.45pm.
"This Is a Bomb: The Nevada Casino Heist" -- BBC Two, 11pm
"This Is a Bomb: The Nevada Casino Heist" concludes on BBC Two at 11pm. The true-crime documentary series ends with the account of what happened when the FBI attempted to disarm John Birges Sr's bomb at Harvey's Resort Hotel Casino, Lake Tahoe, in August 1980. On BBC Two and BBC iPlayer.
In August 1980, John Birges Sr -- a Hungarian-born restaurateur and landscaper from California who had lost considerable money at Harvey's Resort Casino at Lake Tahoe -- placed a 1,000-pound bomb inside the casino, connecting it to a device that was designed to detonate if disturbed. His demand: $3 million in cash, delivered by airdrop. The note he left began "This is a bomb."
The FBI brought in experts, attempted a controlled disarming, and the procedure went wrong. The bomb detonated. It destroyed several floors of Harvey's. Nobody was killed -- the casino had been evacuated -- but the blast was felt for miles. Birges was eventually convicted; the case is studied in forensic and law-enforcement circles for the complexity of the device and the difficulty of the FBI's position.
The series has told this story across its run with the measured structure of the best true-crime documentary work: primary sources, archive footage, expert testimony, and the patience that lets the facts do the work without needing the narration to inflate them. The finale delivers the detonation and its aftermath.
On BBC Two at 11pm. Available on BBC iPlayer.
Euphoria Series 3 -- Sky Atlantic, 9pm (repeat) / 2am (first UK airing)
Euphoria Series 3, Episode 6 "Stand Still and See" is on Sky Atlantic on Monday 18 May 2026. The first UK airing of each new episode is at 2am on Monday morning, simulcast with the US HBO premiere (9pm ET Sunday). The 9pm slot is a prime-time repeat. Final season, 8 episodes. Also available on NOW.
A note on the scheduling, because it causes confusion every week. Euphoria Series 3 airs on HBO in the United States on Sunday evenings at 9pm ET, which translates to 2am Monday BST. Sky Atlantic simulcasts the episode at 2am. If you are a viewer who stays up for it, the 2am slot is the original UK broadcast. If you prefer 9pm, Sky Atlantic replays it. Both viewings of Episode 6 happen on Monday 18 May; the episode itself is the same.
The third and final season -- eight episodes in total, running weekly through to the end of May -- has taken a five-year time jump from where Series 2 left off. Rue (Zendaya) is in her mid-twenties now. Cassie (Sydney Sweeney) is married to Nate (Jacob Elordi) and living in the suburbs, which tells you something about how much things have changed and how much they have not. Hunter Schafer returns as Jules. Episode 6 is titled "Stand Still and See."
On Sky Atlantic. Prime-time repeat at 9pm; first UK airing at 2am. Available on NOW.
Our Tiny Islands -- More4, 9pm
Our Tiny Islands, Series 2, continues on More4 at 9pm. Tonight's episode is set on Iona, the small Scottish island off the west coast of Mull, and features Joanne, a sheep farmer.
Series 2 of this quietly excellent More4 documentary series launched on 4 May 2026 and has been doing what the first series did, which is to find the texture and particularity of life on small British islands without romanticising it or condescending to it. The islands are real, the people are real, and the show is interested in the detail of how life actually works when you are surrounded by water and the mainland is a ferry ride away.
Iona is one of the most historically significant small islands in the British Isles -- the 6th-century monastery founded by Columba, the Book of Kells connection, the particular quality of the light that painters have been trying to capture for centuries -- and it is also a working community with a permanent population that does not spend most of its time thinking about the historical significance. Joanne the sheep farmer is presumably among those people.
On More4 at 9pm. Available on Channel 4 streaming.
Sport today
Arsenal v Burnley -- Sky Sports Main Event + Sky Sports Premier League, k/o 8pm
See the full section above. Coverage from 6.30pm on Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League. This is the one.
"Cricket: IPL" -- Sky Sports Cricket, 3pm
IPL 2026 Match 63: Chennai Super Kings v Sunrisers Hyderabad at MA Chidambaram Stadium (Chepauk) in Chennai. Indian start time 7:30pm IST; UK coverage from 2:50pm BST on Sky Sports Cricket, match start approximately 3pm BST. Sky holds IPL rights in the UK through 2027, meaning every match of the tournament is available live. The Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai is one of the most atmospheric grounds in the IPL calendar; CSK are, at home here, consistently one of the most supported sides in the competition.
"Baseball: MLB" -- TNT Sports 1, 11pm coverage
Detroit Tigers v Cleveland Guardians opens a four-game series at Comerica Park in Detroit. TNT Sports 1 coverage begins at 11pm BST; first pitch is approximately 11:40pm BST (6:40pm ET). This is late-night viewing that rewards dedication: MLB in early-to-mid May means the season is in its working period, the standings are beginning to take shape, and the Guardians-Tigers AL Central rivalry has context. On TNT Sports 1 from 11pm.
Giro d'Italia -- rest day
The Giro d'Italia is on its rest day today. Stage 9 ran yesterday (Sunday 17 May), finishing at Corno alle Scale. Stage 10 -- the second week begins -- is Tuesday 19 May. Nothing to watch today; catch up on Eurosport or GCN Player.
Also worth watching today
Pointless -- BBC One, 5.15pm
Alexander Armstrong and Susan Wokoma co-host Pointless at 5.15pm on BBC One. Series 35 of the format that works because it asks contestants to think differently from how quiz shows usually require -- not "what do you know?" but "what do you know that other people don't know that you know?" Since Richard Osman left in 2022, the co-host seat has rotated; Wokoma and Angela Scanlon are among the regulars in Series 35. Armstrong is excellent at holding the format without dominating it, which is the main thing the co-host chair requires.
Emmerdale -- ITV1, 8pm
The Charity Dingle blackmail storyline on ITV1 at 8pm reaches what looks like a crisis point. Dr Todd, a junior medical colleague, knows that Charity (Emma Atkins) was supposed to be carrying a baby for her granddaughter Sarah and Sarah's husband Jacob -- but the baby is actually fathered by Ross Barton, and Charity has presented it as Sarah and Jacob's. Dr Todd wants £10,000 for silence. Charity's husband Mackenzie Boyd (Mack) is in the frame, and Sarah and Jacob still believe the child is theirs. The storyline has been building to an escalation around this week: Charity has reportedly been trying to raise money by offering her share of the Woolpack at a discount to Kim Tate, which tells you something about the desperation involved.
Streaming corner
The Cage is on BBC iPlayer in its entirety -- all five episodes, from the 26 April premiere through to Episode 4 (which aired last night on BBC One). If you have not watched it, or want to revisit it before the finale on Sunday 24 May at 9pm, tonight is the perfect window. Tony Schumacher's follow-up to The Responder is a compressed, precisely made Liverpool thriller with Sheridan Smith and Michael Socha doing some of the best work of their careers.
Good Omens Series 3 is on Prime Video -- all six episodes, David Tennant and Michael Sheen, from 13 May. Berlin and the Lady with an Ermine is on Netflix -- all eight episodes of the Money Heist spin-off with Pedro Alonso, from 15 May.
Frequently asked questions
What's on TV tonight Monday 18 May 2026?
Monday 18 May 2026: Arsenal v Burnley at 8pm k/o on Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League -- Arsenal can clinch their first Premier League title in 22 years; coverage from 6.30pm. "Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution" Episode 1 of 2 at 9pm BBC Two (UK premiere, 250th anniversary). Believe Me series finale at 9pm ITV1 (Episode 4, Daniel Mays, Miriam Petche as Carrie Johnson). RHS Chelsea Flower Show: BBC One daytime from 2pm (Nicki Chapman, Angellica Bell); BBC Two evening at 8pm (Monty Don, Rachel de Thame). Great Continental Railway Journeys S9 premiere at 6.30pm BBC Two (Michael Portillo, Sardinia/Corsica). Canal Boat Diaries S7 premiere double bill at 7pm + 8pm U&Yesterday (Robbie Cumming). The Family Next Door double bill at 10.45pm + 11.40pm ITV1 (Episodes 3 + 4, Teresa Palmer, Maria Angelico, Jane Harber). Pointless at 5.15pm BBC One. IPL cricket: CSK v SRH from 3pm Sky Sports Cricket. MLB baseball: Tigers v Guardians from 11pm TNT Sports 1. Browse tonight's highlights or what's on right now.
What time is Arsenal v Burnley on TV tonight?
Arsenal v Burnley is live on Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League. Coverage begins at 6.30pm; kick-off is at 8pm BST at the Emirates Stadium. Arsenal require a win to clinch their first Premier League title since the 2003-04 Invincibles season -- 22 years without a league championship. Burnley are already relegated. The match was moved from Sunday 17 May to Monday 18 May for live Sky Sports broadcast.
What is "Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution" on BBC Two?
"Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution" is a two-part BBC Two documentary series timed to the 250th anniversary of American independence. Episode 1, "The Breakup," airs at 9pm on Monday 18 May -- the UK premiere (it first aired on PBS in the US in April 2026). Lucy Worsley frames the Revolution as a marriage breakdown: a tale of mutual incomprehension rather than clean political rupture. The episode covers King George III's "We must master them" speech, Benjamin Franklin's naked air baths, John Wilkes and British radical politics, and the rebels' destruction of a King George III statue in New York -- melted into musket balls. Episode 2, "A Messy Divorce," airs Monday 25 May. Both episodes on BBC iPlayer.
What is Believe Me on ITV1 tonight?
Believe Me Episode 4 of 4 -- the series finale -- airs on ITV1 at 9pm on Monday 18 May. Jeff Pope MBE's four-part true-crime drama covers the Metropolitan Police investigation into Black Cab rapist John Worboys and the subsequent legal battles. Daniel Mays plays Worboys. The three survivor leads are Aimée-Ffion Edwards (Sarah), Aasiya Shah (Laila), and Miriam Petche (Carrie Symonds/Johnson). In the finale, Worboys is granted parole; the women unite to challenge it, with Carrie demanding a judicial review -- which in reality succeeded in 2018. The drama was developed with Carrie Johnson's collaboration. All four episodes are on ITVX.
What is on at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show on TV today?
Monday 18 May 2026 is Press Day at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show -- Royal Visit day, before the public opening on Tuesday 19 May. BBC One carries daytime coverage from approximately 2pm with Nicki Chapman and Angellica Bell. BBC Two airs evening highlights at 8pm with Monty Don and Rachel de Thame. Highlights include The King's Foundation Curious Garden, with David Beckham alongside Alan Titchmarsh. Carol Klein, Adam Frost, and Jamie Butterworth contribute across the week. The public show runs Tuesday 19 May to Saturday 23 May.
Is The Cage on BBC One tonight?
No. The Cage is not on BBC One on Monday 18 May. Some listings have incorrectly placed The Cage series finale on Monday -- this is an error. The Cage is a five-part BBC One thriller that airs on Sunday nights. Episode 4 (the penultimate episode) aired last night, Sunday 17 May. The series finale, Episode 5, airs Sunday 24 May at 9pm on BBC One. The complete series -- all five episodes -- is on BBC iPlayer. If you missed Episode 4, catch it there before next Sunday's conclusion.
What is Canal Boat Diaries Series 7 on U&Yesterday tonight?
Canal Boat Diaries Series 7 premieres on U&Yesterday on Monday 18 May 2026 with a double bill at 7pm (Episode 1) and 8pm (Episode 2). Robbie Cumming and his narrowboat Naughty Lass take a brand-new route from Wales to West Yorkshire -- his first voyage to Wales after ten years living aboard. The series features the Llangollen Canal and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct (UNESCO-listed, 313 metres long, 38 metres high -- the world's longest and highest navigable aqueduct). 10 episodes in total. Available on U streaming.
What is on BBC Two tonight Monday 18 May 2026?
BBC Two Monday 18 May: Great Continental Railway Journeys Series 9 premiere at 6.30pm (Michael Portillo in Sardinia and Corsica); RHS Chelsea Flower Show evening coverage at 8pm (Monty Don and Rachel de Thame); "Lucy Worsley Investigates: The American Revolution" Episode 1 of 2 at 9pm (UK premiere, 250th anniversary, "The Breakup"); "This Is a Bomb: The Nevada Casino Heist" finale at 11pm (John Birges, August 1980, Lake Tahoe, Harvey's Casino, FBI detonation).
What sport is on TV tonight Monday 18 May 2026?
The main sport on Monday 18 May is Arsenal v Burnley, live on Sky Sports Main Event and Sky Sports Premier League -- coverage from 6.30pm, kick-off 8pm BST at the Emirates Stadium. Arsenal can clinch their first Premier League title in 22 years. IPL 2026 Match 63: Chennai Super Kings v Sunrisers Hyderabad on Sky Sports Cricket from 2.50pm (match start 3pm BST), MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai. Late: Detroit Tigers v Cleveland Guardians on TNT Sports 1 from 11pm, first pitch approximately 11.40pm BST, Comerica Park. Note: the Giro d'Italia is on a rest day today -- Stage 10 is Tuesday 19 May.
Tonight's final word
Twenty-two years is a long time. Long enough for children to become adults who have never seen Arsenal win a league title. Long enough for the 2003-04 Invincibles season to have moved from recent history to mythology -- the thing that gets invoked every May when Arsenal are close and then are not. Tonight they are close. The Emirates is full. Burnley, already down, stand between Arsenal and what would be the most anticipated title win in Premier League history for a single club's supporters. Whatever happens -- and football, being football, will provide an account of itself that no preview can fully anticipate -- tonight is the night that the ability to watch live television was invented for.
After the final whistle, BBC Two has earned its 9pm slot. Lucy Worsley on the American Revolution is the serious, vivid, properly funded historical documentary that justifies the licence fee in the way that no streaming service has yet worked out how to replicate: a historian who knows what she is doing, a subject tied to a significant anniversary, and the BBC's willingness to commission two full hours of it and put it on a Monday at nine. Watch it. Both episodes are on iPlayer if you need to start tomorrow.
ITV1's contribution is a finale that will leave a mark. Jeff Pope's Believe Me ends with Carrie Johnson and two other women proving, against the institutional resistance of the Metropolitan Police and then the Parole Board, that they were right all along. It is the television that ITV makes when it is at its best -- a true story, told with patience and care, that asks something of its audience and trusts the audience to respond.
Monday 18 May 2026 is, on balance, an exceptional night of television. The Arsenal match alone makes it a night to remember. The fact that it comes with a Lucy Worsley documentary and a Jeff Pope finale is the sort of scheduling coincidence that makes you grateful for British television's continued habit of trying very hard on the same evening.
Check what's on right now, see tonight's full highlights, or browse all channels. Tomorrow: Chelsea Flower Show opens to the public, Giro d'Italia Stage 10 resumes, and there is more across BBC One and ITV1 for Tuesday 19 May.