Doctor Who release date has been revealed: fans finally learn when the first series of Ncuti Gatwa will air – and it’s the same day as another major music event

The release date for the new series of Doctor Who has finally been revealed, with Ncuti Gatwa’s first full run in the TARDIS set to hit screens on May 11.

For the first time ever, the highly anticipated series will release its first two episodes on BBC iPlayer at midnight.

The episodes will be released later that day on BBC One, ahead of the Eurovision Song Contest grand final.

Viewers outside the UK will see The Doctor and his companion Ruby Sunday begin their time travel adventures on Disney+.

Viewers in the UK can now watch wherever and whenever they want, with the option to stream at midnight on BBC iPlayer or tune in on Saturday evenings in primetime on BBC One.

The new season of Doctor Who sees Ncuti Gatwa return as the Fifteenth Doctor, alongside Millie Gibson as Ruby Sunday, after making their debut in The Church on Ruby Road on Christmas Day.

In the upcoming series, audiences will see the Doctor and Ruby travel through time and space on adventures to lands unknown, to Regency-era England, to space worlds and the 1960s.

This season also sees the return of Michelle Greenidge as Carla Sunday, Angela Wynter as Cherry Sunday and Anita Dobson as Mrs Flood.

The eight-episode series will also feature a range of special guest stars, including Jinkx Monsoon, Aneurin Barnard, Yasmin Finney, Jonathan Groff, Bonnie Langford, Jemma Redgrave, Lenny Rush and Indira Varma. More will be announced soon.

Showrunner Russell T Davies said: “Finally, it is my great joy to be launching a whole new season of the Doctor and Ruby’s adventures together.

‘Monsters! Pursuits! Villains! Mysteries! And a terrifying secret that has spanned decades of time and space. Don’t miss a second!’

Viewers will get their first glimpse of the TARDIS action before tuning in to see if Olly Alexander can be crowned Eurovision champion when he represents Great Britain in the live final in Malmö, Sweden.

Millie will only star for one full series as The Doctor’s companion Ruby, with sources claiming she will make a handful of appearances in the second series before being replaced by Varada Sethu.

For the first time ever, the highly anticipated series will release its first two episodes on BBC iPlayer at midnight, before airing on BBC One later that day ahead of the Eurovision Song Contest.

Amid reports of her sacking, a resurfaced interview saw Millie admit that if her new role in Doctor Who ‘went wrong, at least she would have tried’ as she put her regular job in Coronation Street on the line.

After starring as trouble-prone teenager Kelly Neelan in Coronation Street since 2019, the actress decided to take a huge risk and leave the soap, a prospect that initially seemed to pay off.

Speaking to the Independent last month, Millie explained: ‘I thought, ‘I’m so young, why the hell not? I have no mortgage, I have no children, I have no one to pay. So if something goes wrong, at least I tried.”

Ncuti made his first appearance as The Doctor in the third 60th Anniversary Special in December, when The Doctor was ‘bi-generated’, meaning two incarnations of him existed at the same time.

He and the Fourteenth Doctor (played by David Tennant) foiled the Toymaker’s evil plan, with the previous incarnation deciding to remain on Earth with his own TARDIS, best friend Donna Noble and her family.

Ncuti made his first appearance as The Doctor in the third 60th Anniversary Special in December, when David Tennant also reprized his role as Time Lord.

Ahead of the celebratory episode, titled The Church On Ruby Road, Ncuti revealed he wants to bring his ‘black beautiful self’ to the character, when asked what will be different about his incarnation of The Doctor.

He said: ‘It’s such a difficult question to answer because the role of the doctor is everything anyway.

“He’s an explorer who’s been around for a billion years, so they have so many quirks and complexities and anger and joy and they’re full of a lot of emotions.

“So to choose what else I would put forward is a very difficult question to answer. I guess myself, my black beautiful self. I bring my blackness.”

Ncuti will be the first black actor to take on a full-time role as The Doctor, after Jo Martin briefly played a version of the character in 2020.