WPGH-TV
On December 6, 2017, it was reported that Sinclair and Fox were working on a deal that would see its Fox affiliates renew their affiliation agreement in exchange for Sinclair selling some of its Fox affiliates directly to Fox Television Stations. The deal would see between six and ten Fox affiliates owned by Sinclair and Tribune (all in markets with an NFL team) become Fox owned-and-operated stations. It is not known if WPGH-TV will be one of the stations sold, although the stations being sold to Fox are expected to be from Tribune Media (notably KCPQ in Seattle, where Sinclair already owns KOMO-TV), many of which were previously owned by Fox. A sale to Fox would make WPGH-TV the third O&O station in the Pittsburgh market alongside KDKA-TV and WPCW. It was later reported that sister station WPNT might be included in the deal as well. On May 9, 2018, Sinclair announced that seven Fox affiliates would be sold to FTS, but WPGH-TV was not included and an affiliation renewal was announced for that station instead, keeping WPGH-TV and WPNT with Sinclair.
WPIX
On December 3, 2018, Nexstar Media Group announced it would acquire Tribune's assets for $6.4 billion in cash and debt. The deal—which would make the Irving, Texas-based company the largest television station operator by total number of stations upon its expected closure late in the third quarter of 2019—would result in WPIX becoming Nexstar's largest television station by market size (supplanting MyNetworkTV-affiliated KRON-TV in San Francisco); it will also mark channel 11's first ownership change since its sign-on. Additionally, the merger with Nexstar would also result in WPIX gaining additional sister stations in nearby markets including Albany (ABC affiliate WTEN and Fox-affiliated SSA partner WXXA-TV), Binghamton (NBC affiliate WBGH-CD and ABC affiliate WIVT) and Utica (Fox affiliate WFXV, MyNetworkTV affiliate WPNY-LP and ABC-affiliated SSA partner WUTR) and Providence (CBS affiliate WPRI-TV and Fox-affiliated SSA partner WNAC-TV).