University Challenge (New Zealand)
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| Country of origin | New Zealand |
| Original language(s) | English |
| No. of series | 17 |
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| Camera setup | Split screen |
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| Original release | 26 August 1976 – present |
University Challenge is a long-running New Zealand television quiz show, running originally from 1976–1989 before its revival in 2014 after a 25-year hiatus. The format was based on the British show of the same name, which was itself based on the American College Bowl. It is currently produced by Cue TV in Invercargill.
At its inception in 1976, University Challenge was hosted by Peter Sinclair, though he was briefly dropped in the late 1970s and replaced by University of Otago lecturer Richard Higham. Sinclair returned after just two seasons, and continued in this capacity until the show went into hiatus in 1989. The first series was filmed in the Union Hall, in Otago University's student union building. Later series were filmed in TVNZ's Dunedin studio. It was sponsored by the BNZ, who provided prizes for some of the series. For example, one year, they gave each member of the winning team "an Apple Macintosh computer system, plus a BNZ campus pack account with a $500 credit balance". Ten episodes were aired each year, with the exception of the first season, when there were nine. Most seasons were broadcast on TVNZ channel TV One; those that were not screened on its partner channel TV2. When TVNZ's Dunedin studio was closed and TVNZ moved premises to Auckland, they decided to drop the show.
In July 2014, 25 years after TVNZ stopped producing University Challenge, Cue TV revived the show with station owner Tom Conroy as host. Some of the science questions were replaced with more populist material to enable greater involvement from the audience at home. It began airing on Prime in November 2014.
As with the British show, "starter" questions are answered individually "on the buzzer", and are worth 10 points. The team answering a starter correctly gets a set of "bonus" questions worth a potential fifteen points, over which they can confer. In the last few series before the show's hiatus, a "jackpot bonus" was also available once per game, signalled by a bell. In that, each part of the bonus was worth five points, but getting all three parts right doubled the value of the question to 30 points.
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