CBS to End ‘The Late Show With Stephen Colbert’ Next Year

An era of TV is coming to an end as CBS announced that they were ending The Late Show With Stephen Colbert after a decade on the air — and more than 30 years of airing The Late Show as part of its daily television lineup. The show’s upcoming 2025-2026 season will be its last on the air.

Addressing his audience at the Ed Sullivan Theatre on Thursday, Colbert shared the news. When the crowd booed in response, he replied “Yeah, I share your feelings,” he said. He noted that he is not being replaced as the host of The Late Show; the show itself is “just going away.”

Colbert thanked CBS “or giving me this chair and this beautiful theater to call home.” He also thanked the audience and the 200 people who work on the show.

You can see Colbert’s announcement below.

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Colbert took over The Late Show in September of 2015. The series was created in the fall of 1993 as a new home for David Letterman, who left NBC and his Late Night With David Letterman series to directly compete with The Tonight Show after the network chose Jay Leno to replace Johnny Carson as its host. Letterman remained at The Late Show on CBS until he retired in the spring of 2015. Colbert previously worked on The Daily Show and then hosted a very popular spinoff series, The Colbert Report, from 2005 to 2014.

In a statement, CBS said:

We consider Stephen Colbert irreplaceable and will retire The Late Show franchise at that time. We are proud that Stephen called CBS home. He and the broadcast will be remembered in the pantheon of greats that graced late night television. This is purely a financial decision against a challenging backdrop in late night. It is not related in any way to the show’s performance, content or other matters happening at Paramount.

With CBS getting out of the late night business, that leaves ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live! and NBC’s The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon and Late Night With Seth Meyers as the last broadcasts standing. (CBS canceled the show after The Late Show, After Midnight, in March of this year.)

Even the shows that are still around are facing changes; Late Night With Seth Meyers lost its live band in June of 2024 amidst budget cuts. If you grew up loving series like these, it’s quite the sign of the times.