Is Saturday Night Live Cancelled?

If you tune to NBC later tonight, you’ll notice no new episode of Saturday Night Live is being shown. For the second straight week, there is no new episode of the sketch comedy airing live from 30 Rock. Instead of a new episode airing from Studio 8H tonight, May 13th, viewers will get two SNL episodes in its place—one “retro” episode featuring Moon Knight star Oscar Isaac and Charli XCX from Season 47 beginning at 10:00 p.m. Eastern, and Quinta Brunson and Lil Yachty’s episode from earlier this year in the show’s regular time slot at 11:30 p.m. Eastern.

In fact, no new episode of SNL will air until much later this year. Because of the lapse in new SNL episodes, fans have been wondering…

Has Saturday Night Live been cancelled?

Saturday Night Live has not cancelled—not technically, at least. While the few remaining episodes of the show’s 48th season were cancelled because of the ongoing writers’ strike, it’s fully expected the NBC mainstay will return for Season 49 later this year.

At one point, SNL creator Lorne Michaels even said he wanted to stick with the show until its upcoming 50th season.

“The 50th will be a big event,” Michaels said. “We’ll bring everyone back from all 50 years and hosts and all of that. It will be a very emotional and very strong thing. There won’t be as many plus-ones, I can tell you that much.”

In the same vein, SNL’s longest-tenured star Kenan Thompson has said the show could potentially call it quits after Season 50 during the 2024-2025 television season.

“I mean, there could be a lot of validity to that rumor because 50 is a good number to stop at, you know what I’m saying, that’s an incredible package. [Michaels] will be, you know, probably close to 80-years-old at that point and, you know, he’s the one that’s had his touch on the whole thing,” Kenan told Charlamagne tha God. “So if somebody tries to come into his shoes, you know it’s a good opportunity for NBC as well, you know what I’m saying, so maybe they might slash the budget. And then at that point you can’t really do the same kind of show, so that’s unfair to just watch it really go down kind of in flames or whatever like for real for real because of those restrictions, you know what I’m saying. And it’ll just be a different thing, so capping it at 50 might not be a bad idea, I don’t know.”

How to watch Saturday Night Live

Throughout the remainder of Season 48, currently expected to run through May, NBC is simulcasting new episodes live on both NBC and Peacock. Peacock also serves as the streaming vault for all SNL episodes from its inception, with new episodes being added the day after they air.

Virtually every SNL episode, other than the select few locked away for good because of a variety of reasons, is now available to watch on the streaming service. You can sign up for Peacock here.