Monday night's tv guide has genuine competition at 9pm across three channels -- MasterChef: The Professionals on BBC One, the Gone series finale on ITV1, and the BBC Two documentary about America and China that feels about three years overdue. These are proper tv listings choices, not consolation prizes. Check the tonight page for what's live right now, or browse the full schedule below in this freeview tv guide.
What's On TV Tonight: Quick Picks
- MasterChef: The Professionals ★ -- BBC One, 9pm -- Final four; 27 Michelin-starred chefs at the Goring; the best episode of the series
- Gone -- ITV1, 9pm -- SERIES FINALE; Eve Myles and David Morrissey; is a written note a murder confession?
- Clash of the Superpowers: America vs China -- BBC Two, 9pm -- NEW documentary Ep1/2; Trump, Xi Jinping, Boris Johnson; very timely
- Batch from Scratch: Cooking for Less -- Channel 4, 8pm -- NEW; Joe Swash; six shopping trips in one day
- The Hunt: Prey vs Predator -- Channel 4, 9pm -- Ep 2; first elimination from the forest
TV Guide: Early Evening (7pm – 8:30pm)
EastEnders -- BBC One, 7:30pm
The Truemans have a visitor arriving and the household isn't quite as prepared as they'd like. Meanwhile Suki has made up her mind about Vinny's olive branch -- and the answer is no. If you're the sort of person who follows EastEnders closely enough to care who's on whose side, you'll know what that means. If not, the show remains a reliable 7:30pm fixture that fills the gap between The One Show and whatever you're actually waiting for. Available on BBC iPlayer.
Batch from Scratch: Cooking for Less -- Channel 4, 8pm (NEW)
Joe Swash and the self-styled "Batch Lady" Suzanne Mulholland are back to help households spend less while eating better, and this week's candidates are Nathan and Matt -- a fitness-obsessed couple from Surrey whose dedication to training has done their diet no favours. Matt, apparently, makes six separate shopping trips on some days. Six. Suzanne has seen some things in this job but six is a lot. There's a nervousness about the whole enterprise that makes it oddly compelling viewing, and the results by the end of the hour are, as promised, more efficient. Available on Channel 4 streaming.
Mastermind -- BBC Two, 8pm
The semi-finals continue with specialist subjects including Clint Eastwood westerns and the life of footballer Cyrille Regis -- an interesting pairing that suggests whoever set these questions has eclectic tastes. University Challenge follows at 8:30pm with two teams competing for a quarter-final place. Classic Monday night BBC Two, doing exactly what it says on the tin.
TV Tonight: Prime Time (9pm onwards)
MasterChef: The Professionals -- BBC One, 9pm ★
This is the one tonight. Four chefs left, one kitchen to prove yourself in, and waiting on the other side of the pass: 27 of the best chefs currently working in the UK and Ireland. Between them, those 27 hold 36 Michelin stars. They're eating at the Goring Hotel restaurant in London -- not a bad room to be judged in -- and they will not be generous with their criticism.
The three who make the strongest impression get on a plane to Brunico in Italy's South Tyrol, where Atelier Moessmer is doing things with gastronomy that people in the industry talk about in hushed tones. Chef patron Norbert Niederkofler will give them a masterclass in his philosophy before asking them to cook something that represents it. This is not small pressure.
Marcus Wareing, Monica Galetti and Matt Tebbutt are presiding, as they have been all series. The final is on Thursday at 8pm. If you've been dipping in and out, this is the episode that makes you commit. Available on BBC iPlayer.
Gone -- ITV1, 9pm (SERIES FINALE)
It ends tonight. DS Annie Cassidy -- Eve Myles, excellent throughout -- has been building towards a moment of clarity about Michael (David Morrissey) for six episodes. Now she has it, more or less: a handwritten note in which Michael admits responsibility for Sarah's death. The question she's been circling around is whether admitting responsibility and confessing to murder are the same thing.
They might not be. Annie has found herself more connected to this man than her role as family liaison officer should really allow. She's uncertain in ways that her superiors aren't, because her superiors haven't been sitting across from him for weeks. Michael, for his part, looks numb and ready to stop resisting. Whatever happened to Sarah is about to come out.
It's been a solid ITV drama -- better than the average, partly because Myles and Morrissey are simply very good at their jobs, and partly because the show has been more interested in the moral fog around culpability than in basic whodunit mechanics. Worth seeing through to the end. Available on ITVX.
Clash of the Superpowers: America vs China -- BBC Two, 9pm (NEW)
The timing of this two-parter is not subtle, and that's fine. While the current US administration has been largely occupied with the Middle East, plenty of foreign policy watchers have been pointing out that the deeper long-term rivalry is the one in the title -- and it's not going away.
Veteran documentary producer Norma Percy is behind this, which is a meaningful credit. Her series get inside rooms that other documentaries only describe from outside, and the insiders willing to go on camera here include Boris Johnson, recalling how Trump's first term from 2017 upended Washington's relationship with Beijing -- a story the series traces forward through the Biden years and into Trump's second term. The trade war -- Trump promised to make China pay, Xi Jinping pushed back harder than expected -- is the spine of episode one.
There is, as always with Percy's work, some inevitable self-justifying hindsight from the politicians involved. But the access is exceptional and the television is gripping. Both episodes are on BBC iPlayer if you want to follow straight through. Available on BBC iPlayer.
The Hunt: Prey vs Predator -- Channel 4, 9pm
Episode two of Channel 4's survival reality show, and the forest is getting less friendly. The ten contestants -- split between predators hunting and prey trying to survive -- have had a night to assess their situation and it hasn't put everyone at ease. Tonight sees the first player eliminated from the 400,000 square metre arena, which concentrates the remaining competitors' minds considerably.
The casting continues to do good work here: there are people in that forest who are considerably more capable than they initially appeared, which is exactly the kind of thing that keeps a survival format honest. Available on Channel 4 streaming.
TV Guide UK: Late Night
Rooster -- Sky One, 10pm (NEW EPISODE)
Steve Carell as Greg, a socially awkward author who has somehow ended up as writer-in-residence at Lucia College, continues to accumulate HR meetings at an impressive rate. This week he tells a student she's his "white whale" -- in the Moby-Dick sense, he clarifies, which does not help -- and separately fails a student he's been accused of harassing. The show is genuinely good-natured about the generational divide it's depicting; Greg's disasters land as comedy rather than grievance. Worth half an hour if you're up.
Trying -- BBC One, 10:40pm
Jason and Nikki are closing in on the moment they've been working towards -- being called Mum and Dad for the first time. Jason is getting there more naturally than Nikki, who knows she's trying too hard and can't quite stop. Darren Boyd's Scott remains the show's comic highlight: he's the kind of ludicrous, status-obsessed presence that every comedy drama should have somewhere in it.
This isn't quite the funniest double bill the series has produced, but it's handling some genuine emotional weight and doing it honestly. Available on BBC iPlayer.
Dom Chinea's Cornish Workshop -- U&Yesterday, 8pm (NEW SERIES)
New series for the Shed and Buried alumnus. Dom and Maria's Cornish workshop project continues with a garden pond that isn't going smoothly -- Dom says this with the resignation of a man who has learned to expect it -- plus a drift car build with Sam Lovegrove that involves considerably more controlled skidding than the pond does. Good-humoured, unhurried television for people who like watching things being made.
Sport
Tennis: Miami Open -- Sky Sports Main Event / Sky Sports Tennis, 3pm. Day seven in Florida; yesterday's winners were Jakub Mensik and Aryna Sabalenka.
Men's Cycling: Tour of Catalunya -- TNT Sports 1, 2:15pm. Stage one is a 172.2km loop starting and finishing in Sant Feliu de Guixols.
TGL Golf -- Sky Sports Golf, 1am (Tuesday morning). Opening match of the Finals Series from Palm Beach, Florida.
See our full sport on TV guide for times and channels.
Tonight's TV Listings: Full Schedule
Here are the complete TV listings for Monday 23rd March 2026 across all major Freeview, Sky and streaming channels.
| Time | Channel | Programme |
|---|---|---|
| 2:00pm | BBC One | Just One Thing (Zoe Ball, Roman Kemp, Clive Myrie -- daily wellbeing tips) |
| 7:00pm | BBC One | The One Show |
| 7:30pm | BBC One | EastEnders (Truemans prepare for visitor; Suki and Vinny) |
| 7:30pm | ITV1 | Fletchers' Family Farm (NEW -- Kelvin faces devastating loss) |
| 8:00pm | BBC One | Living without Life's Little Luxuries (Panorama) |
| 8:00pm | BBC Two | Mastermind (semi-final -- Clint Eastwood westerns; Cyrille Regis) |
| 8:00pm | ITV1 | Emmerdale |
| 8:00pm | Channel 4 | Batch from Scratch: Cooking for Less (NEW -- Joe Swash; Nathan and Matt) |
| 8:00pm | Channel 5 | Celebrity Puzzling (NEW) |
| 8:00pm | U&Yesterday | Dom Chinea's Cornish Workshop (NEW SERIES) |
| 8:30pm | BBC One | Trace, Track, Get My Car Back (Toyota Hilux stolen outside Aston Villa) |
| 8:30pm | BBC Two | University Challenge (quarter-finals) |
| 8:30pm | ITV1 | Coronation Street |
| 9:00pm | BBC One | MasterChef: The Professionals (final four; Goring Hotel; 27 leading chefs) |
| 9:00pm | BBC Two | Clash of the Superpowers: America vs China (NEW -- Ep 1/2) |
| 9:00pm | ITV1 | Gone (SERIES FINALE -- Eve Myles; David Morrissey) |
| 9:00pm | Channel 4 | The Hunt: Prey vs Predator (Ep 2 -- first elimination) |
| 9:00pm | Channel 5 | Police Interceptors: Nowhere to Hide (NEW) |
| 9:00pm | Film4 | The Northman (2022 -- Alexander Skarsgard, Nicole Kidman, Anya Taylor-Joy) |
| 9:00pm | Quest | Shed and Buried: Classic Cars (NEW SERIES -- 1950 Austin A90 Atlantic, Bristol) |
| 9:00pm | Dave | QI XL (Christmas special) |
| 10:00pm | BBC One | BBC News |
| 10:00pm | ITV1 | Motorway Cops: Catching Britain's Speeders (NEW) |
| 10:00pm | Sky One | Rooster (Ep 3 -- Steve Carell) |
| 10:00pm | Dave | Have I Got a Bit More News for You (Bill Bailey hosts) |
| 10:05pm | Channel 4 | The Great Celebrity Bake Off for Stand Up to Cancer (80 min repeat) |
| 10:40pm | BBC One | Trying (S1 Ep5 -- Jason and Nikki; Darren Boyd as Scott) |
| 10:45pm | ITV1 | Connecting a Killer: True Crime Presents |
| 11:00pm | BBC Four | The Unseen Alistair Cooke (broadcaster profile; home footage of Charlie Chaplin) |
Freeview TV Guide: What's On Streaming
Can't watch live? This freeview tv guide covers all the catch-up options too. Use our now and next guide to see what's currently on, or browse the full channels list for every available station.
BBC iPlayer: MasterChef: The Professionals, Clash of the Superpowers: America vs China (both episodes), Trying, EastEnders, Just One Thing, Mastermind, University Challenge
ITVX: Gone (full series including tonight's finale), Fletchers' Family Farm, Emmerdale, Coronation Street
Channel 4 streaming: Batch from Scratch: Cooking for Less, The Hunt: Prey vs Predator, Celebrity Bake Off catch-up
My5: Celebrity Puzzling, Motorway Cops: Catching Britain's Speeders, Police Interceptors: Nowhere to Hide
Frequently Asked Questions
Is EastEnders on TV tonight, Monday 23rd March 2026?
Yes -- EastEnders is on BBC One at 7:30pm tonight. The Truemans are preparing for a visitor while Suki dismisses Vinny's attempt to make peace between them. Available on BBC iPlayer afterwards.
What time is MasterChef: The Professionals on tonight?
MasterChef: The Professionals is on BBC One at 9pm. The final four chefs are cooking for a room of 27 top UK and Ireland chefs at the Goring Hotel in London, with Marcus Wareing, Monica Galetti and Matt Tebbutt judging. The series final is on Thursday at 8pm. Available on BBC iPlayer.
Is tonight the last episode of Gone on ITV1?
Yes, tonight is the series finale of Gone on ITV1 at 9pm. DS Annie Cassidy (Eve Myles) has to decide whether Michael's (David Morrissey) handwritten note constitutes a murder confession. The full series is available on ITVX.
What is Clash of the Superpowers: America vs China about?
It's a two-part BBC Two documentary from veteran producer Norma Percy, covering the deterioration of US-China relations from 2017 -- Trump's first term -- through the Biden years and into Trump's second term. Boris Johnson is among the insiders interviewed. Episode 1 airs at 9pm tonight; both episodes are on BBC iPlayer.
What's the best thing to watch on TV tonight?
MasterChef: The Professionals on BBC One at 9pm is the standout -- the final four cooking for a room full of Michelin stars is compelling television. But if you've been following Gone all week, the ITV1 series finale at 9pm is essential. And Clash of the Superpowers on BBC Two feels very timely right now.
TV Guide UK: Final Verdict
Monday's tv guide delivers a proper 9pm three-way split, which doesn't happen all that often. MasterChef: The Professionals is the pick of the night -- cooking for that many Michelin stars in one room is a pressure test that the show rarely equals -- but Gone's series finale on ITV1 will be essential viewing for anyone who's come this far with Eve Myles and David Morrissey. Don't skip it just because MasterChef is on.
Clash of the Superpowers on BBC Two arrives at a moment when the US-China relationship is about as tense as it's been in years. Norma Percy's documentaries have a habit of making you feel like you're getting the real version of events rather than the official one. Worth recording if the 9pm clash forces you to choose.
Browse the full channels list or check what's on now to follow the evening as it unfolds.