1931 in television

• May 1 – The first wedding is broadcast by television, on New York City's W2XCR.
• June 3 – First television outside broadcast of a sporting event: Baird televises the Epsom Derby horse race in England.{{cite web|title=History of British television: Timeline, 1926–2017|url=https://blog.scienceandmediamuseum.org.uk/history-of-british-television-timeline/|publisher=National Science and Media Museum|location=Bradford|date=2011-04-07|accessdate=2023-09-28}}
• July 21 – CBS's station W2XAB begins broadcasting 28 hours a week in New York City. [https://web.archive.org/web/20090722063031/http://history.sandiego.edu/gen/recording/television5.html]
• August – At the Berlin Radio Show, Manfred von Ardenne gives the world's first public demonstration of a television system using a cathode-ray tube for both transmission and reception. Ardenne never develops a camera tube, using the CRT instead as a flying-spot scanner to scan slides and film.Albert Abramson, Zworykin: Pioneer of Television, University of Illinois Press, 1995, p. 111.
• October 9 – Canada's first television station, VE9EC, begins broadcasting in Montreal, Quebec. VE9EC is owned jointly by radio station CKAC and the newspaper company La Presse.{{cite web |url=http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/backgrnd/brochures/b19903.htm |title=CRTC Origins |publisher=Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission |date=2008-09-05 |access-date=2009-11-15 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120110203201/http://www.crtc.gc.ca/eng/backgrnd/brochures/b19903.htm |archive-date=January 10, 2012 |url-status=dead |df=mdy-all }}

Image:Empire-State-Building.JPG on Empire State Building which had opened during May.]]

• October 30 – NBC installs a television transmitter on top of the Empire State Building.
• November 1 – Television images are transmitted from JOAK radio station in Tokyo, Japan by Professors Kenjiro Takayagani and Tomomasa Nakashima. The still images comprise 80 lines at 20 frames per second.
• December 22 – NBC begins broadcasting experimental test transmissions from the Empire State Building transmitter.
• December 23 – Don Lee Broadcasting begins broadcasting low-definition electromechanical television from the station W6XAO (later KTSL) in Los Angeles, broadcasting one hour of film footage, six days per week.

• Exhibition Boxing Bouts premieres on the experimental W2XAB (1931–1932)
• Hints for Swimmers premieres on the experimental W2XAB (1931)
• Piano Lessons premieres on the experimental W2XAB (1931–1932).
• The Television Ghost premieres on the experimental W2XAB (1931–1933).
• Television Today premieres on the experimental W2XAB (1931).
• W2XAB debuts music segments with Connie Boswell, Doris Sharp, Elliot Jaffee, Grace Yeager, Harriet Lee, and Helen Haynes, among others.
• W2XCD debuts a semi-regular segment with singer Alice Remsen.

• January 4 – Rosemary Prinz, U.S. actress (As the World Turns)
• January 10 – Marlene Sanders, television news correspondent (died 2015)
• January 11 – Peter Baldwin, actor (died 2017)
• January 13
• Charles Nelson Reilly, actor, game show panelist (died 2007)
• Rip Taylor, comedian (died 2019)
• January 15 – Thomas Hoving, American museum executive (died 2009)
• January 17 – James Earl Jones, actor
• January 19 – Robert MacNeil, news reporter
• February 6 – Rip Torn, actor (died 2019)
• February 8 – James Dean, actor, East of Eden, Rebel Without a Cause, Giant (died 1955)
• February 13 – Geoff Edwards, game show host (died 2014)
• February 24 – Dominic Chianese, actor
• February 28 – Gavin MacLeod, actor, The Love Boat (died 2021)
• March 11 – Rupert Murdoch, media mogul
• March 20 – Hal Linden, actor, Barney Miller
• March 22 – William Shatner, actor, Star Trek
• March 26 – Leonard Nimoy, actor, Star Trek (died 2015)
• March 27 – David Janssen, actor, The Fugitive (died 1980)
• April 6 – Ivan Dixon, actor, Hogan's Heroes (died 2008)
• April 12 – Betty Clooney, singer (died 1976)
• April 14 – Kenneth Cope, English actor, Coronation Street, Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) (died 2024)
• April 26 – Bernie Brillstein, agent and producer (died 2008)
• May 15 – Ken Venturi, golfer (died 2013)
• May 16 – Jack Dodson, actor, The Andy Griffith Show (died 1994)
• May 18
• Robert Morse, actor (died 2022)
• George Shapiro, producer (died 2022)
• Don Martin, cartoonist (died 2000)
• May 23 – Barbara Barrie, actress, Barney Miller
• June 8 – Dana Wynter, actress (died 2011)
• June 14 – Marla Gibbs, actress, The Jeffersons, 227
• June 20 – Olympia Dukakis, actress, Tales of the City (died 2021)
• June 26 – Marvin Minoff, American film and television producer (died 2009)
• July 1 – Leslie Caron, actress
• July 6 – Della Reese, actress, singer, Touched by an Angel (died 2017)
• July 8 – Roone Arledge, producer (died 2002)
• July 10 – Nick Adams, actor (died 1968)
• July 26 – Robert Colbert, actor, The Time Tunnel
• July 27 – Jerry Van Dyke, actor, Coach (died 2018)
• July 28 – Darryl Hickman, actor (died 2024)
• August 15 – Janice Rule, actress (died 2003)
• August 23 – Barbara Eden, actress, I Dream of Jeannie
• August 25 – Regis Philbin, talk show host (died 2020)
• September 1 – Beano Cook, American television personality (died 2012)
• September 4 – Mitzi Gaynor, singer, actress
• September 9 – Barbara Lyon, singer, actress (died 1995)
• September 10 – Philip Baker Hall, actor (died 2022)
• September 11 – Bill Simpson, actor (died 1986)
• September 12
• Bill McKinney, actor (died 2011)
• Ian Holm, actor (died 2020)
• September 13 – Barbara Bain, actress, Mission: Impossible
• September 17 – Anne Bancroft, actress (died 2005)
• September 19 – Ray Danton, actor (died 1992)
• September 21 – Larry Hagman, actor, I Dream of Jeannie, Dallas (died 2012)
• September 24 – Howard West, TV producer (died 2015)
• September 30 – Angie Dickinson, actress, Police Woman
• October 23
• Jim Bunning, baseball player and politician (died 2017){{Cite web |title=Hall of Famer Bunning passes away |url=https://www.mlb.com/news/hall-of-fame-pitcher-jim-bunning-dies-at-85-c232780372 |access-date=2024-07-22 |website=MLB.com |language=en}}
• Diana Dors, actress (died 1984)
• October 31 – Dan Rather, news reporter
• November 5 – Reese Schonfeld, news reporter (died 2020)
• November 8 – Morley Safer, news reporter (died 2016)
• November 12 – Dick Clair, writer (died 1988)
• November 30 – Jack Ging, actor (died 2022)
• December 3 – Jaye P. Morgan, game show panelist
• December 9 – Paddi Edwards, actress (died 1999)
• December 11 – Rita Moreno, actress
• December 23 – Ronnie Schell, comedian
• December 28 – Martin Milner, actor, Adam-12 (died 2015)

{{Years in TV by country|1931}}

{{Years in television}}