Nick Jr. is an American digital cable and satellite television channel that is owned by the MTV Networks Kids & Family Group, a unit of the Viacom Media Networks division of Viacom. The channel, which is aimed at younger children between 2 and 7 years old, features a mix of originally-produced programming, and series previously and concurrently aired on the "Nick: The Smart Place to Play" block – and its previous iterations – on Nickelodeon.
The channel was originally known as Noggin from its February 2, 1999 launch until September 28, 2009. Sister channel The N was relaunched as TeenNick at the same time as Noggin's relaunch as Nick Jr.; as with TeenNick, Nick Jr.'s name was taken from a former program block on parent channel Nickelodeon, which aired weekday mornings from 1988 to 2009 under the Nick Jr. name; and still survives today on Nickelodeon as a block known in promotions as "Nick: The Smart Place to Play" (which regularly airs from 8:30 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. ET; 7:00 to 10:00 a.m. ET during the summer months or on designated school break periods and major national holidays), which has traditional commercial breaks and no common continuity between each series.
As of August 2013, Nick Jr. is available to approximately 76,389,000 pay television households (66.89% of households with television) in the United States