Its urban music programming includes 106 & Park, a show taped before a live audience counting down the top videos requested by viewers and inviting rap and R&B artists to promote their music. The Deal is BET's flagship program for rap music, and the network also regularly shows a block of R&B videos under the banner BET Now (which no longer airs, except on the Canadian feed). BET has been the target of criticism and protests for broadcasting videos that are accused of promoting immorality. Additionally, the channel shows syndicated television series, original programs, and some public affairs programs. On Sunday mornings, BET broadcasts a lineup of network-produced Christian programming; other, non-affiliated Christian programs are also shown during the early morning hours daily.

As of June 2010, BET no longer has any music video programming besides 106 & Park, The Deal and Video Gospel.

After stepping down as a lobbyist for the cable industry, Freeport, Illinois native Robert L. Johnson decided to launch his own cable television network. Johnson would soon acquire a loan for $15,000, and earned a $500,000 investment from John Malone to start the network. With the fundings, Johnson needed a niche audience to build ratings, so he chose the African-American audience and named his channel Black Entertainment Television. BET began broadcasting as a block over the channel space of Nickelodeon on January 25, 1980. It wasn't until October 1, 1983 when it became its own 24-hour channel.[citation needed]

Initially, the network lineup consisted of music videos, original programs (see Original Series) and reruns of popular black sitcoms. BET was mostly controlled by Johnson, who held 90%, while John Malone held the remaining 10%. Due to recently starting, and low rating, at the time, BET was losing money, but in 1985–1986, things turned around for the young channel.

BET launched a news program, BET News, in 1988, with Ed Gordon as the anchor. Gordon would later host other programs and specials on BET, such as Black Men Speak Out: The Aftermath, related to the 1992 Los Angeles riots and a recurring interview show Conversations with Ed Gordon. In 1996, the talk show BET Tonight debuted with Tavis Smiley as host; in 2001, Ed Gordon replaced Tavis Smiley. In 2002, as part of a reorganization focusing on entertainment productions, BET cut its news staff and canceled BET Tonight along with other public affairs shows hosted by Gordon, Lead Story and Teen Summit. From 2001 to 2005, BET had a daily evening news program BET Nightly News, hosted by Michelle Miller and Jacque Reid.

In 1991, the network became the first black-controlled company on the New York Stock Exchange. In 2003, the network was no longer a black owned business when it was bought by media conglomerate Viacom for $3 billion. In 2005, Johnson retired from the network, turning over his titles as President and Chief Executive Officer to Debra L. Lee, a former Vice President. In 2007, the network reached more than 65 million homes and expanded into other BET-related networks: Centric and digital cable networks BET Hip-Hop and BET Gospel. Network President of Entertainment, Reginald Hudlin, resigned on September 11, 2008. He was then replaced by Stephen Hill, who is also Executive Vice President of Music Programming and Talent.

BET announced in March 2010 that Gordon would return to the network to host "a variety of news programs and specials."

Public Enemy rapper Chuck D, journalist George Curry, writer Keith Boykin, comic book creator Christopher Priest, filmmaker Spike Lee, professor of finance and a social commentator Dr. Boyce Watkins and cartoonist Aaron McGruder (who, in addition to numerous critical references throughout his series, The Boondocks, made a particular episode criticizing the channel), all have protested BET's programming and actions. As a result, BET heavily censors suggestive content from the videos that it airs, often with entire verses removed from certain rap videos. The channel also censors some of the programming it shows. Profanity is often censored.

Enough is Enough is a group led by the Reverend Delman Coates that has devoted much time to protesting BET under the grounds that many of BET's hip-hop videos are degrading. It backed an April 2008 report titled The Rap on Rap by the Parents Television Council that claimed that BET rap programming, which they believed contained gratuitous sexual, violent, and profane content, was targeting children and teens. Furthermore, scholars within the African-American community maintain that BET perpetuates and justifies racism by affecting the interpersonal beliefs others may generalize about African Americans, and also by affecting the psyche of its young viewers through its bombardment of negative images of African Americans.

In a recent interview, BET co-founder Sheila Johnson said she herself is "ashamed" of what the network has become. “I don’t watch it. I suggest to my kids that they don’t watch it," she said. “When we started BET, it was going to be the Ebony magazine on television. We had public affairs programming. We had news... I had a show called Teen Summit, we had a large variety of programming, but the problem is that then the video revolution started up... And then something started happening, and I didn’t like it at all. And I remember during those days we would sit up and watch these videos and decide which ones were going on and which ones were not. We got a lot of backlash from recording artists...and we had to start showing them. I didn’t like the way women were being portrayed in these videos.”