For the first time in its three-season history, “Tracker” enters a new season without being broadcast television’s most-watched show — but CBS is still treating it as a centerpiece of its fall lineup. The network confirmed this week that Season 4 premieres October 4 at 9:30 p.m. ET, continuing its Sunday-night home with Taylor Sheridan’s “Marshals” as its lead-in, according to ScreenRant. Episodes after the premiere shift to their regular 9 p.m. slot.
The confirmation ends months of educated guesswork. CBS locked in Tracker’s Sunday timeslot back in April as part of its broader 2026-2027 schedule announcement, but held off naming an exact date until now, according to MSN. Justin Hartley, who also produces the series, returns as reward-seeking survivalist Colter Shaw, alongside Fiona Rene as attorney Reenie Greene, according to Collider.
Getting Season 4 to screen involved more than just picking a date. After filming its first three seasons in Vancouver, the production relocated to Los Angeles following approval for a sizable California tax credit, with shooting getting underway there in July, according to Tuko.co.ke. The Tracker Fandom wiki notes it’s the first season filmed entirely in Los Angeles, running through an extended production schedule into next spring.
Plot specifics remain scarce, but the setup carries over from where Season 3 left off. That finale aired May 24 on a cliffhanger threatening to expose a long-buried secret about Colter’s family, according to Popverse, and Hartley has previously teased that the fallout from that storyline will carry directly into the new season, according to AnimeNextSeason. The case-of-the-week format is expected to continue, even as the deeper mythology around Colter’s father tightens further.
CBS moved fast to lock in another season, renewing “Tracker” on January 22, 2026, while Season 3 was still airing — one of the network’s earliest pickups in recent memory, per AnimeNextSeason. That confidence tracked with the numbers: the show’s Season 3 premiere pulled roughly 17 million viewers across 35 days of multi-platform tracking, making it the top-rated non-sports entertainment series on broadcast television, according to AnimeNextSeason.
Still, the ratings picture has shifted. ScreenRant noted that this past TV cycle marked the first time “Tracker” lost its status as broadcast’s most-watched show, ceding that spot to “Marshals,” the Sheridan-produced drama that now leads directly into Tracker’s own Sunday slot. Whether the new Los Angeles-based production and a tightening family storyline can help the show reclaim that ground is one of the more interesting questions hanging over the fall season.
