Multichannel Television Sound

This article is about an American analog television standard for sound multiplex. For the secondary audio feed on television in general, see Sound multiplex in broadcasting.

Multichannel Television Sound (MTS) is the method of encoding three additional audio channels into analog 4.5 MHz audio carriers on System M and System N. The system was developed by an industry group known as the Broadcast Television Systems Committee (BTSC), a parallel to color television's National Television System Committee, which developed the NTSC television standard. It was approved in 1984 and was widely deployed in the next two years.

MTS works by adding additional audio signals in otherwise empty portions of the television signal, and allows up to a total of four audio channels, with two producing the left and right stereo channels. An additional second audio program (SAP) is used to broadcast other languages or radio services, including weather radio that could be accessed by the user, typically through a button on their remote control. The fourth channel was a professional audio channel used for internal purposes by broadcasters and is indecipherable with a common consumer receiver.

MTS was considered a major advance in television broadcasting. In 1986, two years after MTS broadcasts began, the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences awarded five Technical and Engineering Emmy Awards to the inventors of the technology and to the two networks, NBC and ABC, that aggressively introduced it. For years, television shows would display a badge during the opening of a program that was "Presented in Stereo". MTS, an analog standard, has not been used since the 2009 switch to digital television.

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