For years, the CBN Satellite Service (later renamed CBN Cable Network in 1984) mixed religious programming with reruns of classic television series to fill out its 24-hour schedule. The network changed its name to The CBN Family Channel in 1988 (revised to The Family Channel in 1990 once CBN spun it out to an indirectly owned for-profit company, International Family Entertainment). It was subsequently renamed Fox Family in 1998 after it was acquired by a partnership between Fox Entertainment Group and Saban Entertainment, then ABC Family after its 2001 sale to ABC parent The Walt Disney Company, and finally to its current name, Freeform in 2016.
For years, the CBN Satellite Service (later renamed CBN Cable Network) combined religious programming with reruns of classic television shows to fill its 24-hour schedule.  The network changed its name to The CBN Family Channel in 1988 and then to The Family Channel in 1990 before being spun off into an independently owned for-profit company, International Family Entertainment. It was renamed Fox Family in 1998 after it was acquired by a partnership between Fox Entertainment Group and Saban Entertainment, then ABC Family after its sale to ABC parent The Walt Disney Company in 2001, and finally to Freeform in 2016.