Highland Cops: release date, what happens and everything you need to know

Highland Cops on BBC2 follows the police team fighting crime in remote areas of Scotland.

Highland Cops on BBC2 is a wee bit different from the usual fly-on-the wall police documentaries that focus on city cops dealing with gritty investigations. 

So yes, it's like a real-life version of the BBC drama Shetland as this six-part docuseries follows Scotland’s Highlands and Islands Division to find out what it takes to police one of the UK’s most beautiful and challenging places. And it turns out the location may be picture postcard but there’s still plenty for the cops to deal with, including wildlife crime, missing hikers and drugs busts! 

Here’s everything we know so far about Highland Cops on BBC2…

Checking out clues in Highland Cops. (Image credit: BBC)

Highland Cops release date

Highland Cops launches on BBC2 on Tuesday April 4 at 8pm. The six-part series runs weekly through spring 2023 will also be shown on BBC Scotland every Sunday and will be available to stream on BBCiPlayer.

What happens in Highland Cops?

Highland Cops follows the police officers who work for Police Scotland’s Highlands and Islands Division, which is actually Britain’s biggest beat. The size of Belgium, it covers 12,000 square miles of lochs, glens, islands and mountains! 

With exclusive access, cameras go behind the scenes of the UK’s most unique police division to follow the twists and turns of all levels of police work from the moment a call comes into the control centre. 

The first episode of Highland Cops gets off to a dramatic start when the team launch a major search operation to find missing survival expert Finn Creaney, who set off on a hike four days ago and hasn’t been since. But as the weather closes in and the hours turn to days, officers suspect something must have happened to Finn and consider making the difficult decision to call off the search.

Meanwhile, in the town of Thurso police intercept a package of illegal drugs at the town’s post office, which leads to a raid on a nearby home, and in Inverness the traffic cops deal with a boy racer convention. 

There’s also a bizarre case of illegal deer poaching involving two dead stags in the back of a vehicle, some DNA swabs and a veterinary autopsy!

Dogs are an essential part of the police work in Highland Cops. (Image credit: BBC)

Is there a trailer for Highland Cops?

There’s no trailer for Highland Cops, but we’ll be sure to post it here if one lands!