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The news came this morning in sales information released by Granada on the digital service's performance for the quarter ending September 30.

In the announcement, Granada says that ITV Digital sales have grown by 36% over the quarter, adding 82,000 subscribers.

The digital broadcaster still faces an uncertain future with reports that Granada and Carlton Communications, which run ITV Digital as a joint venture, are looking for a way out of their investment.

The Financial Times reports that Europe's biggest broadcaster, RTL, has advised the companies to get out of ITV Digital, saying that it would not invest in either while they were still involved.

The announcement makes no comment about the possibility of closing the service. "Our advertising campaign, fronted by Al and Monkey, has been a real success and we expect promotions based around the campaign to play a significant role in the run-up to Christmas. We expect to build our subscriber base on target during the next quarter and beyond," Rob Fyfe, ITV Digital managing director, said in a statement.

Granada also reported that the churn rate, which stands at 23.1%, is lower than forecast. However, earlier this month, ITV Digital started to offer special-rate packages including premium movie and sport channels in order to lower the number of customers cancelling their subscriptions. Sky's churn rate is less than half ITV Digital's at 10%.

ITV Digital has 1.2m subscribers compared with rival BSkyB's 5.3m, and is now available in 4,500 pubs and bars across the country.

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