History Trivia / WheelOfFortune

** The episode scheduled for November 24, 2023 (#S-7870, Black Friday) ended up being at least partially pre-empted in about '''94% of the US''' due to college football and/or basketball on all Big Four networks. CBS's coverage was scheduled to end at 7:30 PM Eastern, with most affiliates leaving ''Wheel'' in said time slot. However, CBS always ends their broadcasts with a sponsored postgame show that lasts for multiple segments and runs at least 10 minutes, resulting in nearly all broadcasts running over the time slot even if the game ended well before, and this one was no exception. Since ''Wheel'' can only air at 7:00 or 7:30 Eastern/Pacific, the former slot was pre-empted outright, and most airings in the latter slot were joined in progress about halfway through; some filled what was left of the time slot with local news instead. ABC, NBC, and FOX airings were pre-empted in all time zones, though nearly all West Coast NBC affiliates aired ''Wheel'' in its entirety in primetime slots. ABC's coverage overran 33 minutes, cutting off or skipping some West Coast airings scheduled after the game. The only affiliates to air the episode on time and in its entirety were Mountain and Pacific CBS's, KTVK in Phoenix and KJZZ in Salt Lake City (both of which are independent), WJFW-TV in Wisconsin, and a few markets that moved ''Wheel'' to a sister station (including Atlanta, Boston, and Dallas). A few affiliates aired ''Wheel'' early on this day, or aired it over the weekend. With the pre-emptions impacting the "Fan Fridays" giveaway, ''Wheel'' didn't even bother showing the giveaway code word on screen and announced that any word at all would be accepted. The pre-emptions impacted all three contestants: one's affiliate (KSDK in St. Louis) outright refused to air the episode despite being well aware there was a local contestant on it, another only saw the second half on KLST in San Angelo, Texas, and the third had to wait until 10:00 PM to see it on KGO-TV in San Francisco, but at least saw it in its entirety.

*** For Season 4, ABC's original plan was to put ''Wheel'' back in its original time slot of Thursdays at 8:00, followed by fellow laid-back game shows ''Series/PressYourLuck'' and ''[[Series/{{Pyramid}} The $100,000 Pyramid]]'' (a lineup previously used for a special night of holiday-themed game show episodes, and with all three having considerable fandom overlap). ''Jeopardy!'' was to be on Tuesdays paired with ''[[Series/TheBachelor Bachelor in Paradise]]''. However, ABC later decided to move all ''Bachelor'' series to Thursdays and move both ''Jeopardy!'' and ''Wheel'' to Wednesdays at 8:00 and 9:00, respectively (with ''Pyramid'' following them both at 10:00, and ''Press'' moving to Tuesdays at 10:00 with a delayed premiere), leaving ''Wheel'' once again "buried" by ''Jeopardy!'', which, by this point, has seen and will continue to see several more primetime specials on the network. ''Wheel's'' order was also reduced from 13 episodes to 10 for this season while ''Jeopardy!'''s was not. On October 11, 2023, ABC quickly produced a special edition of ''Series/TwentyTwenty'' on the Israel-Hamas war to air at 10:00. Rather than skip ''Pyramid'', the network decided to move that show to 9:00 and skip ''Wheel'', even though that week's episode had already aired the day prior in Canada, resulting in CTV needing to pull the show from its schedule the following week to allow ABC to catch up.

*** April 1, 2002 (episodes #S-3661 through 3665): Southern Hospitality.
*** September 16, 2002 (#S-3716 through 3720): Southern Hospitality.
*** October 4, 2004 (#S-4116 through 4120): Southern Hospitality.
*** October 15, 2012 (#S-5676 through 5680): Southern Hospitality.
*** October 7, 2013 (#S-5866 through 5870): Southern Hospitality. This week was included in GSN's rotation at the time and did continue rerunning after the 2017 controversy.
*** December 22, 2014 (#S-6116 through 6120): Southern Hospitality.
*** March 20, 2017 (#S-6751 through 6755): Southern Charm.

** In Singapore, recent episodes of the American version air on [=MediaCorp=] Channel 5. These airings remove two of the four commercial breaks, only retaining the ones after Round 2 and before the Bonus Round. Also, all promotional plugs are edited out, including plugs for the show's website. Round 1 is followed immediately by Pat announcing Round 2's category due to the removal of the first commercial break and the Mystery Round sponsor plug, although the tail end of the $10,000 wedge wipe is still sometimes intact. Since the episodes air several months after they do in North America, closing segments that discuss specific occasions such as holidays are completely omitted, cutting straight from the Bonus Round to the credits. They also air ''Celebrity Wheel'', with some banter for the celebrities edited for time or content.

** Reruns of 2010s and 2020s episodes on GSN, Netflix, and Pluto TV remove almost all promotional plugs, and the "Retro Bonus Round", a play-at-home feature shown after Round 2 on some of such episodes, is often (but not always) edited out, as well as the SPIN ID drawings and any throws to them from Pat. Anything related to home viewer sweepstakes are excised as well; one episode even removed an entire montage of an event featuring winners of a previous sweepstakes. The Secret Santa episodes in particular were very choppy, with abrupt cuts to commercial before Pat even finished bidding the losing contestants goodbye.
** On Netflix, the February 4, 2020 episode, when it was available, completely skipped over the Round 3 segment. It was likely accidentally cut while editing out the commercial break placeholders. This carried over to Pluto TV, resulting in longer ad breaks when aired on the 24/7 channel to compensate for the shorter runtime.

** In Seasons 38 and 39, most Tuesday episodes featured several plugs for T-Mobile, including their logo added to the Toss-Up wipes. Although these remain intact during summer reruns, Saturday reruns of these seasons generally avoid including Tuesday episodes at all. In the rare case one ''does'' rerun on a Saturday, the episode is edited to remove all T-Mobile plugs by changing the Toss-Up wipes to the regular ones, removing the logo on the left side of the category strip, and editing out any verbal mention of the brand from Pat, or the episode was one of the few not to include the plugs in the first place.

** The September 11, 2001 episode (#S-3517) was unable to be archived by fans for obvious reasons, and it is not known to have rerun anywhere in the United States (although it likely did air on [=MediaCorp=] Channel 5 in Singapore, which is known to have aired Season 19 sometime later). It was even pre-empted on independent stations airing the show, such as WLNY-TV in New York, which simulcasted CNN's coverage of the attacks. One of the contestants from this episode stated years later that she never got to see it, but did receive her winnings. Many years later, it was discovered that WJLA-TV in Washington, DC aired this episode, followed immediately by #S-3518 and 19, on the night of Saturday, September 15 at 11:30 PM, and is preserved on the Internet Archive's 9/11 TV Time Capsule in one-minute chunks, although the program titles are incorrect, likely because making up the episodes in this fashion was a last-minute decision.

** In Singapore, [=MediaCorp=] Channel 5 skips over episode #PT-203 (''Celebrity Wheel'', October 10, 2021, featuring Music/DonnyOsmond, Creator/JeffGarlin, and Creator/AmberRiley), possibly due to Jeff Garlin's obnoxious LargeHam behavior throughout the episode in relation to his eventual firing from ''Series/TheGoldbergs'', which he promoted during the episode. Regrettably, this is the only primetime episode to date where the same celebrity wins both Bonus Rounds.

** In the 2010s, fans of both shows noticed the opposite with executive producer Harry Friedman mostly getting recognized for his efforts on ''Jeopardy!'' rather than ''Wheel''. ''Wheel'' started to get more respect during Mike Richards' brief tenure in the early 2020s.

* PopCultureUrbanLegends: It was rumored that Creator/WilliamShatner left a CelebrityEdition mid-episode in the late 1990s due to throwing a temper tantrum over his poor performance. However, upon being asked about this by a fan on Twitter, Pat replied that Shatner had to leave because the taping had run unusually long and created a scheduling conflict. Furthermore, when the episode was uploaded online in 2021, Shatner was shown to be in a pleasant mood despite having no score at the time.

* UrbanLegendOfZelda: Fans have circulated rumors about the old trilon-based puzzle board finding a home at the Smithsonian Institution. The board was actually rejected due to its size and is now "gone" according to Pat. The only surviving prop from it is a "W" slide on display at the Sony Studios' Wheel Hall of Fame.

** In Canada, ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune'' started on Yes TV for Season 1 (the same network that airs the syndicated version, and still does today), then moved to the larger CTV for Seasons 2 onward, with reruns airing on E! (both networks are owned by Bell Media; [=NBCUniversal=] does not have any ownership of E! Canada aside from licensing the E! brand). In Season 3, most episodes premiered on CTV 2. The brief 2008 revival, ''Million Dollar Wheel of Fortune'', was on the Nine Network. The 2024 version hosted by Graham Norton will air on Network 10.
** The Australian version's original run from 1981-2006 was on the Seven Network

** The current one has hopped around a lot in Canada too, having been on channels such as Creator/{{CBC}}, A-Channel (now CTV Two), and now the smaller Yes TV.
** In Canada, ''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune'' started on Yes TV for Season 1 (the same network that airs the syndicated version, and still does today), then moved to the larger CTV for Seasons 2 onward, with reruns airing on E! (both networks are owned by Bell Media; [=NBCUniversal=] does not have any ownership of E! Canada aside from licensing the E! brand). In Season 3, most episodes premiered on [=CTV2=].

*** On a November 2008 episode, the $3,500 wedge and the adjacent additional Bankrupt were each placed one wedge clockwise, putting the Bankrupt where $3,500 should go. In Round 3, a contestant picks up the Million-Dollar Wedge...and on the next spin, lands on that Bankrupt that should have been the big money. Thankfully, he had a Free Spin, which he used...and hit Lose a Turn (meaning he could have eventually used the Free Spin on that had the wedges been placed correctly). This was ultimately subverted, as he won anyway and did not land on the $100,000 that the million would have replaced.

** Pat DoubleSubverted this on the December 23, 1988 nighttime show, where he gave an [[StylisticSuck intentionally off-key]] rendition of "White Christmas" with Vanna accompanying him on piano.
** ...But he played it straight on a December 1994 episode where, after a contestant failed to solve the bonus puzzle ZORRO, he gave a somewhat hammy (if perfectly in-key) rendition of the 1957 ''Zorro'' TV theme, even writing a "Z" in the air with the Bonus Round envelope.

* HideYourPregnancy:
** Averted with Vanna's two pregnancies. As there was simply no way to conceal it due to all the walking around that she does, she just wore maternity clothes throughout.
** A more tragic straight example occured when a round with the puzzle VANNA'S PREGNANT had to be edited out of a 1992 episode due to her miscarriage shortly before the episode aired.

** Although the show has seen less coveted time slots as the seasons progressed, ABC is fond of using ''Celebrity Wheel'' repeats as an hour of filler programming, due to its lack of series continuity. On September 29, 2022, ABC scheduled a new "bonus episode" leading into an airing of Disney Halloween staple ''Film/HocusPocus''.
** Australian cable channel FOX Arena airs American ''Wheel'' considerably more than America does. In terms of unique episodes, the show airs each weekday in a two-hour block consisting of two syndicated episodes and one ''Celebrity'' episode. The episodes re-air frequently in various other time slots throughout the week and on weekends.
** Green Bay, Wisconsin FOX affiliate WLUK-TV is one of the few stations that opts to air ''Wheel'' earlier instead of later or not at all when pre-empted by a sporting event. When sporting events start at 7:00 PM Eastern/6:00 PM Central (pre-empting both ''Wheel'' and ''Jeopardy!''), WLUK will cut its 5:00 newscast in half to allow ''Wheel'' to move an hour early to 5:30 PM leading into the sport, while ''Jeopardy!'' airs after the game and a newscast, despite airing ''Jeopardy!'' first under normal scheduling. They also do this during the MLB All-Star Game, a time where ''Wheel'' is usually a repeat while ''Jeopardy!'' is still showing new episodes.

** One of the biggest complaints from fans about the Prize Puzzle was that the puzzles were often poorly-written and appeared to be taken directly from travel brochures. By the 2020's, the majority of them were an arbitrary combination of a positive adjective and a travel or beach-related noun, or a "Phrase" that was merely a sentence related to being happy or being on vacation. Starting in Season 41, Prize Puzzles are no longer directly related to the trip.

** One of the biggest obstacles for syndicated ''Wheel'' is ''Monday Night Football'' whenever it airs nationally on ABC. In terms of U.S. coverage, ABC is the largest network carrier of the show, including in all but one of the Nielsen markets with an owned-and-operated (O&O) station. When ''MNF'' aired on a weekly basis until 2005, the West Coast would air the show on a one-day delay (with a "new" episode on Saturday instead of a repeat) while the East Coast was unaffected. Starting in 2020 (Season 38 of ''Wheel''), ABC began airing some games nationally again, the first of which usually falls on the same day as the season premiere of ''Wheel''. Since ABC now airs college football on Saturdays, West Coast affiliates are now forced to schedule impacted Monday episodes shortly after the games, which can result in these episodes not airing in their entirety, if at all, depending on the length of the game. Starting in 2023 (Season 41), ABC began adding a partial simulcast of ESPN's ''Monday Night Countdown'' before some (not all) national games at 7:30 PM Eastern, ''Wheel's'' time slot on the O&O's and in most markets in general. This pre-empted the first two Monday episodes of Pat Sajak's final season, including the premiere, in '''three of the Top 4 Nielsen markets''' (fortunately, all six contestants on those episodes were from markets where ''Wheel'' airs on non-ABC affiliates), along with one Secret Santa episode. The third Monday episode was pre-empted on ''all'' ABC affiliates due to a game that started at 7:00 PM instead of 8:00. Due to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, ABC soon decided to air ''MNF'' nationally ''every week of the 2023 season'', impacting several more episodes on the West Coast. Pat posted an apology for the pre-emptions, but claimed the show was "powerless" in doing anything about it.
** Another broadcast rule exclusive to ''Wheel'' is that it is only current daily syndicated program that does not offer a second daily airing at all (whether a different run like every other game show, or an encore of the same episode like talk shows and entertainment news shows). If you miss an episode on your local station and it is not made up, your only legal chance of seeing it again is if it shows up as a repeat the following summer, on a Saturday next season (if ''that'' doesn't get pre-empted by college football), or, even less likely, on streaming. While ''Jeopardy!'' occasionally posts full episodes that were subject to pre-emptions on their [=YouTube=] channel, ''Wheel'' has never posted more than a full round. Since there are only 65 weekday repeats and 52 weekend repeats a year, compared to a season's 195 episodes, several episodes only get to air one time. In TheNew20s, ''Jeopardy!'s'' second airing (known as ''Daytime Jeopardy!'' or ''Jeopardy! II'') is seeing more clearance as a replacement for ending LongRunners such as ''The Ellen [=DeGeneres=] Show'' and ''Series/DrPhil'', but affiliates are forced to find another program that isn't ''Wheel'' to pair it with; some have chosen another puzzle game show, ''Series/PeoplePuzzler''. Many fans view ''Daytime Jeopardy!'' as pointless since it is currently only a few months behind the main run, and for unknown reasons, CBS Media Ventures still refuses to offer an equivalent for ''Wheel''.
** Affiliates that have a partnership with local major league sports teams tend to pre-empt ''Wheel'' frequently for specials or pregame shows on or close to game days (even when the game does not immediately follow ''Wheel's'' time slot), or even weekly programs discussing said team. The worst offender is WKRN-TV in Nashville, which pre-empts ''Wheel'' every Tuesday during NFL season for a local Titans show. Combined with the ''Monday Night Football'' pregame starting in 2023, Nashville only got '''9 out of 15 episodes''' during the first three weeks of Season 41. WIVB-TV in Buffalo and WROC-TV in Rochester also frequently pre-empt ''Wheel'' for Buffalo Bills specials, even when they don't actually air the games themselves. Despite being CBS affiliates, both stations also pre-empted the Season 41 premiere due to the Buffalo Bills competing in that night's ''Monday Night Football.'' ''Jeopardy!'' is unaffected in almost all of these instances. The one affiliate where ''Jeopardy!'' is pre-empted by the Bills specials is on WETM in Elmira, New York, a market much smaller than Buffalo and Rochester.

** Usually when a live sporting or political event happens in East Coast primetime, its West Coast broadcast pre-empts ''Wheel's'' regular time slot. Usually, West Coast affiliates move Wheel to primetime slots after the event, but before the late-night local news, most commonly in the 9:00 or 10:00 PM hours. However, this can still result in the show getting pre-empted in part or in full if the event runs long, especially if the affiliate has an additional local newscast or postgame program following the event that slides the programming after it. The premieres for Seasons 39 and 40 both got partially or entirely pre-empted in some West Coast markets on both their original ''and'' rerun airings due to being scheduled after NFL or NBA games both times.

** The April 24, 2020 episode, which was the highest-winning episode of its week and featured a rare $50,000 Bonus Round win, managed to get pre-empted nationwide on ABC affiliates ''twice''. Its original airing was the same day as Day 2 of the NFL Draft, where coverage starts at 7:00 PM Eastern. A repeat was scheduled over a year later on September 11, 2021, the final Saturday repeat of Season 37 and the second weekend of college football. ''All three contestants'' lived in markets that air ''Wheel'' on ABC. The winning contestant watched on flagship affiliate WABC-TV, which slotted the episode on Saturday, April 25, immediately following Day 3 of NFL Draft coverage and a local newscast. The Draft overran and caused the newscast to run late, with ''Wheel'' getting joined in progress in the middle of Round 3. WABC did air the repeat airing in its entirety, but at 5:00 AM on a Sunday morning. Another contestant stated that her affiliate (KGUN) also joined the original airing in progress after the Draft (after airing the same day's ''Jeopardy!'' in its entirety), but did air the rerun after college football without issue. Several ABC affiliates did not air either of the two airings. Fortunately, the episode is in Pluto TV's rotation.
** The Season 37 finale ended up being scheduled the same day as the NFL kickoff game, which begins pregame coverage at 7:00 PM Eastern (7:30 until 2019) on NBC and pre-empts ''Wheel'' (a rerun during most years) on all of its affiliates. Since it was the second of only two new episodes that week, some affiliates opted to air the episode the following day in place of that day's rerun. At least one opted to air it the following Saturday in place of the final Season 36 rerun. A few others aired the episode early; Michigan affiliate WPBN aired it at 11:00 AM.

** The syndicated version is likely the most pre-empted syndicated program on TV, due to its unique rule that it can only be aired in the prime access hour (7-8 PM Eastern/Pacific), which is when networks and local stations generally prefer to air sporting events, pregame shows, award shows, local debates, local NFL team shows, local news specials, delayed or extended newscasts, and even ''infomercials''. This is especially true in the Central Time Zone, where ''Wheel'' exclusively airs at 6:30 PM, due to most stations airing local news at 6:00, giving sister program ''Jeopardy!'' less restrictions for its time slotting (most air it at 3:30 or 4:30 PM preceding local and national news, meaning it rarely gets affected by sports or specials). ''Wheel's'' prime access time slot mandate was a result of [=KingWorld=], its former syndicator, not wanting affiliates to slot it too close to the daytime version, which would potentially cause confusion among viewers and unnecessary competition between two versions of the same program. Although the daytime version has been off the airwaves for more than three decades, the rule still stands today. ''Jeopardy!'' does not have this rule since the current version of the show has never run in both daytime and syndication at the same time. Affiliates are generally not allowed to move ''Wheel'' temporarily to a morning or afternoon time slot if a pre-emption is planned, instead having to move it overnight or to a sister station, if at all.
** One of the biggest obstacles for syndicated ''Wheel'' is ''Monday Night Football'' whenever it airs nationally on ABC. In terms of U.S. coverage, ABC is the largest network carrier of the show, including in all but one of the Nielsen markets with an owned-and-operated (O&O) station. When ''MNF'' aired on a weekly basis until 2005, the West Coast would air the show on a one-day delay (with a "new" episode on Saturday instead of a repeat) while the East Coast was unaffected. Starting in 2020 (Season 38 of ''Wheel''), ABC began airing some games nationally again, the first of which usually falls on the same day as the season premiere of ''Wheel''. Since ABC now airs college football on Saturdays, West Coast affiliates are now forced to schedule impacted Monday episodes shortly after the games, which can result in these episodes not airing in their entirety, if at all, depending on the length of the game. Starting in 2023 (Season 41), ABC began adding a partial simulcast of ESPN's ''Monday Night Countdown'' before some national games at 7:30 PM Eastern, ''Wheel's'' time slot on the O&O's and in most markets in general. This pre-empted the first two Monday episodes of Pat Sajak's final season, including the premiere, in '''three of the Top 4 Nielsen markets''' (fortunately, all six contestants on those episodes were from markets where ''Wheel'' airs on non-ABC affiliates). The third Monday episode was pre-empted on ''all'' ABC affiliates due to a game that started at 7:00 PM instead of 8:00. Due to the WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes, ABC soon decided to air ''MNF'' nationally ''every week of the 2023 season'', impacting several more episodes on the West Coast. Pat posted an apology for the pre-emptions, but claimed the show was "powerless" in doing anything about it.

** As for streaming services, Netflix had featured a rotation of a total of 74 episodes (25 at a time, with one episode being featured in two batches) that only ranged from Seasons 34-37. The announcement of the launch of a 24/7 ''Wheel'' channel on Pluto TV was initially celebrated by fans. Then when streaming actually started, ''still'' nothing older than Season 34 was initially offered, and Pluto initially stated that this would not change. The Vulture journalist who originally reported the announcements, himself a fan of retro ''Wheel'', stated that he could not get an answer as to why ''Wheel'' did not go any earlier. Catering to demand, Pluto TV added 100 episodes ranging from Seasons 20-30 (2002-2012) in March 2023, and to everyone's surprise, 98 more episodes ranging from Seasons 1-16, plus Pat and Vanna's first shows from the daytime series, were added. Many of these episodes had never been seen since their original broadcasts or syndication reruns, which are never more than one season old.

** November 20, 2018: A contestant mispronounced the $3,000 Toss-Up puzzle PROVINCETOWN as "PROVINCETON", but this was not noticed at the time. Before the Bonus Round, Pat acknowledged the situation, and since the $3,000 wouldn't have changed who won the game, the game proceeded as normal and Pat announced that an extra $3,000 would be awarded to the other two contestants.

** June 30, 2021: A repeat of the November 25, 2020 episode, which became infamous for Pat yelling at an "ungrateful" contestant after he questioned a Crossword puzzle with the word combination "kitchen oven". This airing edited out Pat's yelling, but still left in Pat saying towards end of the show, "I'm sorry I yelled at you."

** Affiliates that have a partnership with local major league sports teams tend to pre-empt ''Wheel'' frequently for specials or pregame shows on or close to game days (even when the game does not immediately follow ''Wheel's'' time slot), or even weekly programs discussing said team. The worst offender is WKRN-TV in Nashville, which pre-empts ''Wheel'' every Tuesday during NFL season for a local Titans show. Combined with the ''Monday Night Football'' pregame starting in 2023, Nashville only got '''9 out of 15 episodes''' during the first three weeks of Season 41. WIVB-TV in Buffalo and WROC-TV in Rochester also frequently pre-empt ''Wheel'' for Buffalo Bills specials, even when they don't actually air the games themselves. Multiple notable episodes (including at least one $100,000 win) ended up pre-empted by this and several other local specials dedicated to things as menial as '''Susan B. Anthony's birthday'''. Despite being CBS affiliates, both also pre-empted the Season 41 premiere due to the Buffalo Bills competing in that night's ''Monday Night Football.'' ''Jeopardy!'' was unaffected in almost all of these instances; when that show is affected by an hour-long special, WROC (which is not part of a duopoly with a sister station to move the game shows to, unlike WIVB) will sometimes opt out of the second half hour to allow the show to air, but they have never done this with ''Wheel''. The one market where ''Jeopardy!'' is affected by the Bills specials is Elmira, New York, which is far smaller than Buffalo and Rochester.

** October 18, 2023 (''Celebrity Wheel''): An episode featuring Roy Wood Jr. was delayed a week, then shelved completely, due to Wood quitting his role as ''Series/TheDailyShow'' correspondent less than two weeks prior.

** Episode #PT-405 (''Celebrity Wheel'') was featured in early promos for Season 4, but has been shelved by ABC due to the episode featuring Roy Wood Jr. just after he quit ''Series/TheDailyShow''. Originally scheduled for October 11, it was replaced with a rerun from Season 3 and moved back a week to October 18, then was shelved completely when the "final" October 11 episode (#PT-406) also got delayed to the 18th. In Canada, since CTV and E! had already aired #PT-406 the week before ABC did, they were originally scheduled to air #PT-405 on October 17 and 21, respectively. Since Sony has no immediate plans to distribute this episode, Canada pulled the show entirely from both networks that week (not helping matters is the fact that CTV also airs ''The Daily Show''), replacing them respectively with ''Series/TheVoice'' and a repeat of ''The $100,000 Pyramid''.

** October 18, 2023 (''Celebrity Wheel''): An episode featuring Roy Wood Jr. was delayed a week, then shelved completely, due to Wood quitting his famous role as ''Series/TheDailyShow'' correspondent less than two weeks prior.

** The syndicated version is likely the most pre-empted syndicated program on TV, due to its unique rule that it can only be aired in the prime access hour (7-8 PM Eastern/Pacific), which is when networks and local stations generally prefer to air sporting events, pregame shows, award shows, local debates, local NFL team shows, local news specials, delayed or extended newscasts, and even ''infomercials''. This is especially true in the Central Time Zone, where ''Wheel'' exclusively airs at 6:30 PM, due to most stations airing local news at 6:00, giving sister program ''Jeopardy!'' less restrictions for its time slotting (most air it at 3:30 or 4:30 PM preceding local and national news, meaning it rarely gets affected by sports or specials). ''Wheel's'' prime access time slot mandate was a result of [=KingWorld=], its former syndicator, not wanting affiliates to slot it too close to the daytime version, which would potentially cause confusion among viewers and unnecessary competition between two versions of the same program. Although the daytime version has been off the airwaves for more than three decades, the rule still stands today. ''Jeopardy!'' does not have this rule since the current version of the show has never ran in both daytime and syndication at the same time. Affiliates are generally not allowed to move ''Wheel'' temporarily to a morning or afternoon time slot if a pre-emption is planned, instead having to move it overnight or to a sister station, if at all.
** One of the biggest obstacles for syndicated ''Wheel'' is ''Monday Night Football'' whenever it airs nationally on ABC. In terms of U.S. coverage, ABC is the largest network carrier of the show, including in all but one of the Nielsen markets with an owned-and-operated (O&O) station. When ''MNF'' aired on a weekly basis until 2005, the West Coast would air the show on a one-day delay (with a "new" episode on Saturday instead of a repeat) while the East Coast was unaffected. Starting in 2020 (Season 38 of ''Wheel''), ABC began airing some games nationally again, the first of which usually falls on the same day as the season premiere of ''Wheel''. Since ABC now airs college football on Saturdays, West Coast affiliates are now forced to schedule impacted Monday episodes shortly after the games, which can result in these episodes not airing in their entirety, if at all, depending on the length of the game. Starting in 2023 (Season 41), ABC began adding a partial simulcast of ESPN's ''Monday Night Countdown'' before their national games at 7:30 PM Eastern, ''Wheel's'' time slot on the O&O's and in most markets in general. This will pre-empt ''every fall episode in Monday'', including the premiere of Pat Sajak's final season (fortunately, all three contestants on that episode were from markets where ''Wheel'' airs on CBS), in '''three of the Top 4 Nielsen markets'''. Pat posted an apology for the pre-emptions, but claimed the show was "powerless" in doing anything about it.
** Another broadcast rule exclusive to ''Wheel'' is that it is only current daily syndicated program that does not offer a second daily airing at all (whether a different run or an encore of the same episode). If you miss an episode on your local station and it is not made up, your only legal chance of seeing it again is if it shows up as a repeat the following summer, on a Saturday next season (if ''that'' doesn't get pre-empted by college football), or, even less likely, on streaming. While ''Jeopardy!'' occasionally posts full episodes that were subject to pre-emptions on their [=YouTube=] channel, ''Wheel'' has never posted more than a full round. Since there are only 65 weekday repeats and 52 weekend repeats a year, compared to a season's 195 episodes, several episodes only get to air one time. In TheNew20s, ''Jeopardy!'s'' secondary run (known as ''Daytime Jeopardy!'' or ''Jeopardy! II'') is seeing more clearance as a replacement for ending LongRunners such as ''The Ellen [=DeGeneres=] Show'' and ''Series/DrPhil'', but affiliates are forced to find another program that isn't ''Wheel'' to pair it with; some have chosen another puzzle game show, ''Series/PeoplePuzzler''. Many fans view ''Daytime Jeopardy!'' as pointless since it is currently only a few months behind the main run, and for unknown reasons, CBS Media Ventures still refuses to offer an equivalent for ''Wheel''.
** Affiliates that have a partnership with local major league sports teams tend to pre-empt ''Wheel'' frequently for specials or pregame shows on or close to game days (even when the game does not immediately follow ''Wheel's'' time slot), or even weekly programs discussing said team. The worst offender is WKRN-TV in Nashville, which pre-empts ''Wheel'' every Tuesday during NFL season for a local Titans show. Combined with the ''Monday Night Football'' pregame starting in 2023, Nashville only got '''9 out of 15 episodes''' during the first three weeks of Season 41. WIVB-TV in Buffalo and WROC-TV in Rochester also frequently pre-empt ''Wheel'' for Buffalo Bills specials, even when they don't actually air the games themselves. Multiple notable episodes (including at least one $100,000 win) ended up pre-empted by this and several other local specials dedicated to things as menial as '''Susan B. Anthony's birthday'''. Despite being CBS affiliates, both also pre-empted the Season 41 premiere due to the Buffalo Bills competing in that night's ''Monday Night Football.''
** The ABC O&O's, all of which carry ''Wheel'' at 7:30/6:30 Central (with the exception of KTRK-TV in Houston, which does not carry ''Wheel'' due to opting for an hour-long 6:00 newscast), are fond of pre-empting ''Wheel'' (but never ''Jeopardy!'') with O&O-exclusive specials or events, the most of notorious of which is the CMA Awards' red carpet arrivals, which they began airing in 2019. When ''Wheel'' swapped out two travel-themed weeks for reruns at the height of the COVID-19 Pandemic (see DistancedFromCurrentEvents), all of the ABC O&O's pre-empted ''Wheel'' with the Mountain Time Zone feed of ''ABC World News Tonight'', despite airing only one hour after the East Coast feed in most cases. Although only reruns were affected, fans generally did not agree with this decision, as many considered the show a comforting distraction during the hard times. Two of the seven stations opted to restore ''Wheel'' for the second week.
** Usually when a live sporting or political event happens in East Coast primetime, its West Coast broadcast pre-empts ''Wheel's'' regular time slot. Usually, West Coast affiliates move Wheel to primetime slots after the event, but before the late-night local news, most commonly in the 9:00 or 10:00 PM hours. However, this can still result in the show getting pre-empted in part or in full if the event runs long, especially if the affiliate has an additional local newscast or postgame program following the event that slides the programming after it. The premieres for Seasons 39 and 40 both got partially or entirely pre-empted in some West Coast markets on both their original ''and'' rerun airings due to being scheduled after NFL and NBA games.

** When Thursday Night Football began on network television in 2014, then-producer Harry Friedman was not pleased after learning that the event began at 7:30 PM Eastern, ''Wheel's'' most common time slot (and ''Jeopardy!'s'' slot in several markets). When he first expressed concern, representatives from the NFL and CBS outright '''lied''' to him that it would start at 8:00 and would not affect ''Wheel'' or ''Jeopardy!'' on the East Coast. Since an episode with a million dollar win was set for the Thursday of the season premiere week, Friedman had it rescheduled to air on Wednesday. Thursday Night Football originally aired interchangeably on CBS and NBC, then moved all games to FOX from 2018-21, before moving exclusively to Amazon Prime, NFL Network, and select local affiliates starting in 2022. Fortunately for ''Wheel'', only 11 FOX affiliates were carrying the show in 2018 (decreasing to 10 a year later), and very few airings of ''Wheel'' are affected by local broadcasts of games since the deal with FOX expired.
** The Summer and Winter Olympics on Creator/{{NBC}} pose a problem for most of its affiliates that air ''Wheel''. Starting in 2006, NBC began offering an optional pre-show, ''The Olympic Zone'', at 7:30 PM Eastern. Most affiliates carry this, and some that pre-empt ''Jeopardy!'' for this move that show to replace ''Wheel'' for the entirety of the Olympics, or pair it with an additional local pre-show at 7:00 to pre-empt both shows. In February 2022, the Beijing Winter Olympics conflicted with a historic and near-impossible streak of three $100,000 wins in a row. Despite news of this leaking in advance and the constant references to the wins throughout the week actually giving the show a sense of continuity (a common reason for program directors favoring ''Jeopardy!'' over ''Wheel''), many affiliates still refused to air these episodes in favor of ''The Olympic Zone'' or moving ''Jeopardy!''. Fortunately, these episodes were re-broadcast in July 2022.
** The April 24, 2020 episode, which was the highest-winning episode of its week and featured a rare $50,000 Bonus Round win, managed to get pre-empted nationwide on ABC affiliates ''twice''. Its original airing was the same day as Day 2 of the NFL Draft. A repeat was scheduled over a year later on September 11 (or 12), 2021, the second weekend of college football. ''All three contestants'' lived in markets that air ''Wheel'' on ABC. The winning contestant watched on flagship affiliate WABC-TV, which slotted the episode on Saturday, April 25, immediately following Day 3 of NFL Draft coverage and a local newscast. The Draft overran and caused the newscast to run late, with ''Wheel'' getting joined in progress in the middle of Round 3. WABC did air the repeat airing in its entirety, but at 5:00 AM on a Sunday morning. Another contestant stated that her affiliate (KGUN) also joined the original airing in progress after the Draft (after airing the same day's ''Jeopardy!'' in its entirety), but did air the rerun after college football without issue. Several ABC affiliates did not air either of the two airings. Fortunately, the episode is available on Pluto TV.
** The Season 37 finale ended up being scheduled the same day as the NFL kickoff game, which begins pregame coverage at 7:00 PM Eastern on NBC and pre-empts ''Wheel'' (a rerun during most years) on all of its affiliates. Since it was the second of only two new episodes that week, some affiliates opted to air the episode the following day in place of that day's rerun. At least one opted to air it the following Saturday in place of the final Season 36 rerun. A few others aired the episode early; Michigan affiliate WPBN aired it at 11:00 AM.

*** For Season 3, the show remained on the Sunday lineup, still mostly during NFL season, and its success, along with ''Jeopardy!'''s AdoredByTheNetwork status at ABC, resulted in ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' joining it as a standalone series. Keeping with the O&O's order of ''Jeopardy!'' before ''Wheel'', ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' replaced ''Wheel'' in the 8:00 slot, sliding the latter to 9:00 and replacing ''Series/SupermarketSweep'' (which, like ''Wheel'', was originally Sundays at 8:00, but then slid to 9:00; it got cancelled soon after). Despite this, reruns of both series (and ''Jeopardy! Masters'') aired on Tuesdays during Spring and Summer 2023 with ''Wheel'' first this time. By the second half of the season, ''Celebrity Jeopardy!'' moved to Thursdays, with ''Wheel'' briefly returning to the 8:00 slot, but the rest of the season, a mix of new episodes and reruns, aired inconsistently on various days at either 8:00 or 9:00, and the season finale did not air until May 2023, four months after the previous new episode (and only to cross-promote yet another ''Jeopardy!'' primetime event). Furthermore, while reruns were planned to air every Tuesday for the entire summer up until Season 4's premiere, the reruns ceased a month earlier than planned, with the rest of them being replaced with ''Celebrity Family Feud'' reruns, despite the primetime ''Jeopardy!'' reruns continuing.
*** For Season 4, ABC's original plan was to put ''Wheel'' back in its original time slot of Thursdays at 8:00, followed by fellow laid-back game shows ''Series/PressYourLuck'' and ''[[Series/{{Pyramid}} The $100,000 Pyramid]]'' (a lineup previously used for a special night of holiday-themed game show episodes), with ''Jeopardy!'' on Tuesdays paired with ''Series/BachelorInParadise''. However, ABC later decided to move all ''Bachelor'' series to Thursdays and move both ''Jeopardy!'' and ''Wheel'' to Wednesdays at 8:00 and 9:00, respectively (with ''Pyramid'' following them both at 10:00, and ''PYL'' moving to Tuesdays at 10:00 with a delayed start), leaving ''Wheel'' once again "buried" by ''Jeopardy!'', which, by this point, has seen and will continue to see several more primetime specials on the network. ''Wheel's'' order was also reduced from 13 episodes to 10 for this season while ''Jeopardy!'''s was not. On October 11, 2023, ABC quickly produced a special edition of ''20/20;'' on the Israel-Hamas war to air at 10:00. Rather than skip ''Pyramid'', the network decided to move that show to 9:00 and skip ''Wheel'', even though that week's episode had already aired the day prior in Canada, and was the only one of the three shows to have already aired.

** When the show gets pre-empted in a significant number of markets during an episode with a SPIN ID drawing, such as the Secret Santa weeks, rather than announce the winning SPIN [=IDs=] online for viewers (or potential winners) who couldn't see them, ''Wheel's'' response is simply to go to the show's website and click the "Did My SPIN ID Win?" button. They also send this response to local stations to post should they get inquiries or complaints from viewers about missed SPIN [=IDs.=]

** October 18, 2023 (''Celebrity Wheel''): An episode featuring Roy Wood Jr. was replaced with a rerun and delayed a week due to Wood quitting his famous role as ''Series/TheDailyShow'' correspondent less than two weeks prior.

*** For Season 4, ABC's original plan was to put ''Wheel'' back in its original time slot of Thursdays at 8:00, followed by fellow laid-back game shows ''Series/PressYourLuck'' and ''[[Series/{{Pyramid}} The $100,000 Pyramid]]'' (a lineup previously used for a special night of holiday-themed game show episodes), with ''Jeopardy!'' on Tuesdays paired with ''Series/BachelorInParadise''. However, ABC later decided to move all ''Bachelor'' series to Thursdays and move both ''Jeopardy!'' and ''Wheel'' to Wednesdays at 8:00 and 9:00, respectively (with ''Pyramid'' following them both at 10:00, and ''PYL'' moving to Tuesdays at 10:00 with a delayed start), leaving ''Wheel'' once again "buried" by ''Jeopardy!'', which, by this point, has seen and will continue to see several more primetime specials on the network. ''Wheel's'' order was also reduced from 13 episodes to 10 for this season.

** February 18, 2021 (''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune''): An episode featuring Chris Harrison as a contestant was delayed a week by swapping it with the following week's episode. This was in response to many ''Series/TheBachelor'' fans and contestants accusing Harrison of defending racism after his comments on photos of Rachael Kirkconnell attending a banned Antebellum South-themed ball, followed by Harrison's announcement that he would be leaving ''The Bachelor'' temporarily. When the episode of ''Celebrity Wheel'' aired, ABC gave it barely any promo, and they ran a disclaimer that it was taped in December 2020. The episode was included in [=GameTV's=] rotation, still with the disclaimer.
** May 10, 2023 (''Celebrity Wheel of Fortune''): Mayim Bialik promoted her sitcom ''Series/CallMeKat'' whose cancellation was announced five days before the episode aired.

* AuthorsSavingThrow: Prior to the premiere of Season 39, promos stated that the season would see ''Wheel's'' first tournament since the permanent retirement of Friday Finals in January 1999. After Mike Richards was fired as executive producer, this was scrapped, and Pat even dissed the concept of a tournament at the closing of an episode late in the season. When Bellamie Blackstone became executive producer in Season 40, she is finally reviving Friday Finals for the season's first-ever WWE Week, and the show is explicitly referring to the week as a tournament.

** One of the biggest obstacles for syndicated ''Wheel'' is ''Monday Night Football'' whenever it airs nationally on ABC. In terms of U.S. coverage, ABC is the largest network carrier of the show, including in all but one of the Nielsen markets with an owned-and-operated (O&O) station. When ''MNF'' aired on a weekly basis until 2005, the West Coast would air the show on a one-day delay (with a "new" episode on Saturday instead of a repeat) while the East Coast was unaffected. Starting in 2020 (Season 38 of ''Wheel''), ABC began airing some games nationally again, the first of which usually falls on the same day as the season premiere of ''Wheel''. Since ABC now airs college football on Saturdays, West Coast affiliates are now forced to schedule impacted Monday episodes shortly after the games, which can result in these episodes not airing in their entirety, if at all, depending on the length of the game. Starting in 2023 (Season 41), ABC began adding a partial simulcast of ESPN's ''Monday Night Countdown'' before their national games at 7:30 PM Eastern, ''Wheel's'' time slot on the O&O's and in most markets in general. This pre-empted the premiere of Pat Sajak's final season (along with several other Monday episodes) in '''three of the Top 4 Nielsen markets''' among several others (fortunately, all three contestants were from markets where ''Wheel'' airs on CBS). Pat posted an apology for the pre-emptions, but claimed the show was "powerless" in doing anything about it.