True Crime TV This Week: Is Dateline, 20/20 or 48 Hours New? Night-by-Night Grid and Return Dates

Short version: Dateline and 20/20 are Friday shows at 9 p.m. ET, and 48 Hours is a Saturday show at 10 p.m. Nothing in this lineup airs Monday through Thursday. The block above has the nights for the week of Oct. 26 and the fall return dates.

Friday, Sept. 25 brought both season openers in the same 9 p.m. hour. Dateline's two-hour "The Family Plot" covered a Utah shooting that ended with three convictions, laid out in our Matt Restelli case update. 20/20 spent its two hours on a 1986 Salem State murder solved by DNA, which our Claire Gravel case file traces from Route 128 to the 2026 verdict.

When do Dateline, 20/20 and 48 Hours come back?

Key takeaways

• Both Friday premieres aired Sept. 25 in the same hour, on NBC and ABC. The Oct. 2 Friday brought new hours from both.
• Dateline gets two hours on premiere night, per NBC's own fall grid. Lester Holt has said the season leans on the longer format.
• NBC opened with "The Family Plot," ABC with "The Salem Strangler." The Dateline and 20/20 pages carry each new case once it's listed.
• The Oct. 17 premiere on CBS's schedule page came 147 days after 48 Hours' last new hour.

Is anything on true crime TV tonight?

No. None of the three shows has a weeknight slot — Dateline and 20/20 are Friday programs, 48 Hours is a Saturday one. Monday through Thursday is always empty here.

The Friday, Oct. 23 hours have aired: “Blindsided” on Dateline and “Help Dale Find Dee” on 20/20. As of Friday, Oct. 30, NBC's page carries a sneak peek, “The Orchard,” for Dateline that night, ABC News' trailer names “Justice for Faith” for 20/20, and CBS lists a new 48 Hours for Saturday, Oct. 31.

What aired on Friday, Sept. 18?

Dateline ran "The Man Who Loved Christmas" at 10 p.m. ET, an hour later than its usual slot, with Blayne Alexander reporting. The case was the 2022 poisoning death of Harold Allen in Freetown, Indiana — a case 48 Hours had already told in April as "The Root Beer Float Murder."

It is closed. Ashley Jones is serving 50 years; her mother died before charges were filed. 20/20 ran two new hours of "Mr. & Mrs. Murder" from 9 p.m.

What is on the Dateline season 35 premiere?

"The Family Plot," two hours with Josh Mankiewicz reporting. It's the July 2024 shooting of Matt Restelli, who drove from California to his mother-in-law's house in American Fork, Utah, and was killed minutes after walking in.

It first looked like self-defense. It wasn't: his wife pleaded guilty, and her brother and mother were convicted by juries and sentenced this year. Each outcome is laid out in our Matt Restelli case update, and the Is Dateline new tonight? page carries the week-to-week answer.

And the 20/20 premiere?

"The Salem Strangler," two hours with Deborah Roberts reporting. It's the 1986 killing of Claire Gravel, a 20-year-old Salem State student, a case that stayed open until DNA from a 2007 attack in Hamilton led to John Carey. He was convicted in March 2026 and is serving life without parole.

The show hasn't been idle: "Mr. & Mrs. Murder" ran two new hours on Sept. 18, a week before the official season start, and the Lindsay Clancy special aired Sept. 4. We covered that one in our recap of the hour.

Where did 48 Hours go?

Saturday football, then a held premiere. CBS has run games through the 10 p.m. hour every Saturday since midsummer, and the network's own schedule page listed season 39 for Oct. 17, which came 147 days after the last new hour, "Kouri Richins: Behind the Facade," aired May 23. The Futon Critic was still showing Oct. 10 as of that Saturday, the date CBS's page carried before its Sept. 29 update; TVmaze listed Oct. 17, and the premiere aired that night as a double feature.

The Richins case has moved since that broadcast: a Utah judge ordered $1.37 million in restitution, and her fraud trial is still ahead.

👉 If you only remember one date from this page, make it Oct. 17 — the night 48 Hours came back, per CBS's schedule page.

How do I stream each one?

Dateline lands on Peacock the day after it airs, 20/20 on Hulu, 48 Hours on Paramount+. Channels, time zones and back catalogs are in the viewing guide.

FAQ

Is Dateline new tonight? Only on Fridays. Season 35 opened Sept. 25; "Heartless," with Josh Mankiewicz reporting on the Talina Galloway case, aired Friday, Oct. 9 at 9 p.m. ET. "The Betrayal of Kirby Carpenter," with Andrea Canning reporting, aired Friday, Oct. 16 at 9 p.m. ET; "Blindsided," with Keith Morrison reporting on the Brandon Boudreaux case, aired Friday, Oct. 23 (NBC's Dateline page dates the full episode 10/23/2026). For Friday, Oct. 30, NBC's Dateline page carries a sneak peek titled "The Orchard" (posted Oct. 29; description says Friday, Oct. 30, at 9/8c on NBC).

What case is on 48 Hours this Saturday? Saturday, Oct. 17 was the Season 39 premiere, a double feature from 9 p.m. ET: per the 48 Hours page at CBS News, "The Corn Rake Witness" (9 p.m.) and "The Detective and the Chewing Gum Sting" (10 p.m.). Oct. 3 and Oct. 10 were listed as preempted. Saturday, Oct. 24 carried "What the Cameras Saw" at 9/8c and "The Mansion Above Dale Hollow Lake" at 10/9c (CBS News' schedule page, updated Oct. 25). As of Oct. 29 the same page lists Saturday, Oct. 31 as new at 10/9c: “Jade Benning’s Final Call.” Our Is 48 Hours new tonight? page tracks it week to week.

Is 20/20 on this week? Not Monday through Thursday. The latest new hour, "Help Dale Find Dee," was named for Friday, Oct. 23 in an ABC News trailer, and ABC News' 20/20 page lists it first as of Sunday, Oct. 25; an ABC News trailer names “Justice for Faith” for Friday, Oct. 30. Before it, "The Suitcase Murders" aired Friday, Oct. 16 at 9 p.m. ET and "Born to Kill," on the 2016 Cati Blauvelt case, on Oct. 9. The Friday, Oct. 2 hour was "Home Alone," on the 2015 Allison Feldman case.

While the shows are off

Several cases we follow have dates in early November or are still waiting on a ruling. The Delphi appeal was argued Sept. 21, and as of Oct. 31 we have not found a report of a ruling by the three-judge panel. San Diego County's sentencing of Larry Millete moved from Sept. 29 to Nov. 2, and a Massachusetts judge heard arguments Sept. 29 on whether Lindsay Clancy is retried without ruling; that case is back in court Nov. 2. Tennessee began an execution on Sept. 30 and did not complete it. The Naresh Bhatt no-body trial opened Oct. 5 in Virginia with jury selection and reached opening statements on Oct. 7, and the Kouri Richins fraud case had a scheduling conference set for Oct. 9; as of Oct. 31, we have not found a report of what happened there.

Further out: the Lori Vallow Daybell appeal on Nov. 2, the Mangione state hearing on Dec. 10, the parole board's advanced Menendez hearing in March 2027, Alex Murdaugh's retrial in Sumter County with jury selection April 5, 2027, and Bryan Kohberger's bid to withdraw his guilty plea in June 2027. Everything else is in Case Updates; the show archives are at Dateline and 48 Hours.

Also in our case files: a Colorado judge raised Barry Morphew's bond to $10 million, and Caleb Flynn's murder trial in Troy, Ohio, ended Sept. 29 with guilty verdicts on all nine counts. On Oct. 5 he was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Sources

• ABC News — trailer: 20/20 ‘Help Dale Find Dee’ airs Oct. 23, posted Oct. 19; read Tuesday, Oct. 20.
• NBC — fall 2026 premiere dates, Dateline in the Friday 9–11 p.m. block
• NBC Insider — Dateline season 35: premiere date, correspondents, two-hour plan
• ABC press release — fall 2026 premiere dates, 20/20 on Sept. 25
• TV Insider — ABC's fall 2026 schedule, Friday nights
• ABC episode description via Laughing Place — "The Salem Strangler"
• CBS News — 48 Hours episode schedule, football preemptions and the Oct. 17 premiere (updated Oct. 1)
• Dateline NBC — preview: "Unmasking the Monster," Friday, Oct. 2
• Dateline NBC — preview: "Heartless," Friday, Oct. 9
• The Futon Critic — Dateline NBC listings
• Dateline NBC — preview: "The Man Who Loved Christmas"
• CBS Sports 2026 college football television schedule

Listings data via TVmaze and The Futon Critic.

By the True Crime On Air desk · Updated Oct. 31, 3:17 a.m. ET