The half-hour programme, running for 40 weeks of the year, is broadcast on late Thursday evenings at 11:10pm.
Michael Crow, Holyrood-based political correspondent for STV's Scotland Today and North Tonight, presents the programme, interviewing some of Scotland's best-known politicians. The programme also features reports and contributions from the rest of STV's political unit - political editor Bernard Ponsonby, Westminster correspondent Rae Stewart, senior political reporter Jamie Livingstone and reporter David Torrance.
Politics Now is broadcast from STV's headquarters at Pacific Quay in Glasgow, sharing the same set as The Five Thirty Show. Prior to 2005, the programme was broadcast from STV's former headquarters at Cowcaddens, Glasgow and the studios of Grampian Television (now STV North) in West Tullos, Aberdeen.