[Neil Jones]

Wikipedia suggests they film for eleven months of the year, three months in advance.

For comparison EastEnders is usually six weeks ahead, although by this point in the year they've ramped up production to Christmas, and by the time Christmas does comes round they'll be complete to the end of February.

[James2001]

A bit less than Doctor Who I imagine.  Probably less than each minute of Doctor Who.

Though Doctor Who likely makes several times its budgets back through international sales, home video, merchandise etc. which Doctors won't

[DeMarkay]

It needs to finish with… wait for it…

Doctors Who

[Keith]

Fundamentally and bleakly, it's all just accounting. Drama is expensive; continuing drama less so, but still costlier than non-drama replacements. Continuing drama also suffers from having less commercial return potential, so it's not as worth the investment, especially when ratings are no longer standouts. 

Nonetheless, I suspect the cut in new non-continuing drama hours/costs over the last few years is roughly similar, it's just less noticeable as it's not in a permanent slot.

I imagine that long-running cast members in continuing drama can also become rather expensive. I seem to recall the first year BBC star salaries were published it included a few such actors/actresses, and then (perhaps conveniently) BBC Studios became private and therefore excluded from the list.

Presumably continuing dramas also have limited opportunities for being repeat on BBC, let alone being reshown commercially elsewhere. Whilst dramas probably cost more per episode to make they can be repeated multiple times on the BBC, as well as potentially being sold to other channels/countries/platforms.

[gottago]

Is there a world in which they could potentially air repeats of River City from a certain point years ago in its history as a replacement? Would be tricky to find an episode that could act as a complete starting point for viewers who've never seen it before and they certainly wouldn't air it from as far back as 2002 as it would look so noticeably old. I've always been surprised the BBC hasn't tried to get more value out of that show given how many episodes there are in the can and how so many viewers will never have seen it.

[Jon]

I think there’s more chance of them showing Doctors repeats for the next 5 years.

[Stooky Bill]

Wikipedia suggests they film for eleven months of the year, three months in advance.

For comparison EastEnders is usually six weeks ahead, although by this point in the year they've ramped up production to Christmas, and by the time Christmas does comes round they'll be complete to the end of February.

Apparently Doctors will stop filming in March and go off air in December. I don't think it  broadcasts over the summer usually, but next summer is the Olympics so they'll presumably only need 6 or 7 months in the can when they stop production

[Alf Stewart]

Apparently Doctors will stop filming in March and go off air in December. I don't think it  broadcasts over the summer usually, but next summer is the Olympics so they'll presumably only need 6 or 7 months in the can when they stop production

They do film far more in advance than the other soaps/continuing drama so that would probably be about right. I think they take a broadcast break at Easter too and If need be I'm sure they could extend the summer break or add in a broadcast break somewhere else later in the year to ensure the episodes last until the end of the year.

[RhysJR]

Last day of filming for Doctors today

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