‘Downton Abbey’ season 6 Christmas Special (series finale) time confirmed by ITV

For those of you wondering when you are going to be able to sit down and watch the “Downton Abbey” Christmas Special this year, we now have an answer for you!

ITV has announced that the special, which is going to also double as the final episode of the critically-acclaimed and globally-successful series, is going to air on December 25 (go figure) at 8:45 p.m. local time. This means that by the time it comes on the air, you are probably going to be able to kick back and enjoy most of the rest of your British TV lineup.

So what else is there to enjoy on Christmas Day this year? Think along the lines of “Call the Midwife,” “Doctor Who,” “Coronation Street,” and so much more. British television has become a tradition on the holiday, which is something that is diametrically opposed to how the medium operates in the United States. Typically, networks stateside are so concerned about losing ratings that they tend to not air any content from December 22 onward until around January 2 or 3.

Let’s hope that for the sake of ITV, this special does offer them one last ratings boost. While BBC is currently performing rather well with “Poldark,” “Doctor Who,” and many other programs, we’re not sure that ITV has found a direct answer to “Downton” just yet. We’d say that the closest thing that they may have is “Home Fires,” which drew some solid ratings as a short series earlier this year following “Britain’s Got Talent” on Sunday nights.