Strong increase in high definition channels continues in Europe. - After spectacular development over the past three years, the European Audiovisual Observatory confirms the continued progression being made by high definition (HD) on the European market with a further surge during the first months of 2012. The number of channels was 274 in 2009, 612 end 2011 and 941 end September 2012 (+54% compared to December 2011). Although the sports, cinema and general channels (the main private channels and public service channels) have always been the most numerous to be broadcast in high definition, followed by the documentary channels, leisure and fiction channels, the gap between sport and other kinds of channels has grown considerably in 2012. Concerning the origin and the licenses for HD channels, the United Kingdom is the country that has the most (229), followed by Germany (108) and France (95). (IL/transl.jl)