Saturday Morning Cartoon

A Saturday morning cartoon is the colloquial term for the animated television programming that has typically been scheduled on Saturday mornings on the major American television networks from the 1960s to the present; the genre's peak in popularity mostly ended in the 2000s while the popularity of cable and satellite television, as well as the internet, has provided 24 hour access to cartoons for children. In the United States, the generally accepted times are considered to be Saturday mornings are 8 a.m. to noon Eastern. In addition, until the late 1970s, American networks also had a schedule of children's programming on Sunday mornings, though most programs at this time were repeats of Saturday morning shows that were already canceled, out of production or both. Cable television networks have since revived the practice of debuting their most popular animated programming on Saturday mornings, and most of the broadcast networks maintain a limited animated presence to meet federal educational-informational children's programming mandates. In some markets, some shows were pre-empted in favor of syndicated or other types of local programming.