Call the Midwife film and spin-off show announced - as BBC gives update on its future

• Call the Midwife is heading to the big screen.
• A film has been confirmed by the BBC.
• While a WW2-set prequel show has been announced.

Call the Midwife’s ‘iconic’ characters are heading to the big screen, it has been announced. The BBC has laid out its plans for the future of the beloved historical drama.

A spin-off series set during World War II, featuring younger versions of familiar faces, has also been confirmed. It is due to be released next year - as well as a regular season of the hit show.

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The Beeb has also offered up a few morsels about this year’s Christmas special. It is quite the busy time for the inhabitants of Nonnatus House.

Here’s all you need to know:

BBC confirms exciting plans for Call the Midwife Christmas special

Once again fans will be treated to a double dose of festive action this year as a two-part special has been announced. And in a major twist, much of the action will take place away from Poplar.

The 2025 Christmas special of Call the Midwife will be set in Hong Kong - as well as its usual London home. It will be followed by a regular season in January 2026.

A brief tease reads: “When senior members of the Nonnatus House staff head to Hong Kong on a mercy mission, the younger midwives are left to cope alone. As the Christmas action shifts between the sun-drenched Far East and a snowy East End, Sister Julienne suddenly finds herself excited about the Order’s future.

“After years of battling change, she decides to embrace it, work with it, and see what love can do. This change of energy reverberates throughout series 15. The new series kicks off in 1971 with several of the ladies embracing Women’s Lib and burning their bras outside Nonnatus House.

“As the year unfolds, we see the team handle cases including premature birth, placenta previa, kidney cancer, tuberculosis and slavery.”

Call the Midwife set for spin-off and a film

However the news doesn’t stop with an update on this year’s Christmas special. The world of Nonnatus House will also be expanding.

A prequel TV series set in Poplar during World War Two will be made for the BBC in 2026. In addition, Neal Street, in development with BBC Film, are producing a Call the Midwife film.

Not many details have been announced about the movie, except that it will be set overseas in 1972 and feature iconic characters from the show.

Heidi Thomas OBE, creator and writer, says: “The opening of new doors at Nonnatus House feels profoundly emotional, and yet just right. I have never run out of stories for our midwives, and I never will.

“But having wept, laughed, and raged my way from 1957 to 1971, I found myself yearning to delve into the deeper past. The Blitz years in the East End were extraordinary - filled with loss, togetherness, courage and joy.

“The bombs fell, the babies kept on coming, and the Sisters kept on going. There will be so much in the prequel for our wonderful, loyal fans, including the appearance of some familiar (if much younger!) faces.”

She added: “As the classic Call the Midwife series moves further into the 1970s, it also seems the perfect time for our much-loved regulars to take a short break from Poplar and test themselves in an unfamiliar landscape. The rise in hospital births, and changes in the NHS, have clipped their wings, and this is their chance to take flight and work out what really matters.

“Whilst the location of the film remains top-secret, I can say it is going to look absolutely fantastic on the big screen.”

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