NBC News Now, NBC News’ ad-supported streaming news network, is announcing Zinhle Essamuah is officially joining NBC Nightly News Sunday anchor Kate Snow as co-host of the 2-4 p.m. ET hours of NBC News Daily on NBC and NBC News Now.
Essamuah has guest-anchored the time period recently and serves as an NBC News correspondent.
“Anyone who has worked with Zinhle knows how integral she is to the work being done here,” NBC News Now evp Janelle Rodriguez told staffers in an internal note. “Her deeply-reported Black maternal health coverage and impact reporting on juvenile facilities in Louisiana are just a few examples of the deep-dive reporting that viewers turn to News Now for.”
In addition to the Essamuah announcement, NBC News Now announced Monday that the streamer can henceforth be accessed on Comcast’s Xfinity X1 today at no additional cost for Xfinity TV consumers.
NBC News Now’s parent brand NBCUniversal is owned by Comcast.
NBC News Now is integrated directly into X1’s channel guide and elsewhere throughout the experience, making it easy for Xfinity TV customers to discover NBC News Now content. Customers can also quickly tune to the channel by saying NBC News Now into the Xfinity voice remote, or go to a show-specific page by saying its name, such as Morning News Now or Top Story with Tom Llamas.
“We are incredibly proud of NBC News Now’s continued growth and are excited to offer even more accessibility to our world-class reporting,” Rodriguez added in a formal statement. “This first-of-its kind distribution for NBC News Now reflects our core missions of making high-quality journalism accessible to everyone, at no extra cost, and bringing an ease to viewers by being available on a platform where they consume content.”
NBC News Now continues to set viewership records, marking its two best quarters on record in Q1 and Q2 of 2023. This follows NBC News Now’s sixth straight quarter of year-over-year growth.
NBC News Now, which focuses on traditional hard news as opposed to opinion, features more than 11 live original hours of programming, including Morning News Now, NBC News Daily, Meet the Press Now, Hallie Jackson Now, Top Story with Tom Llamas and Stay Tuned Now with Gadi Schwartz, as well as a slate of original specials, documentaries and the latest breaking news coverage.