The British singer who led 2012 and 2013 winners Karise Eden and Harrison Craig to success is heading back to Australia for 2017's season of The Voice in a move hoped to boost the show's declining ratings in recent years.

Seal will be back alongside fellow coach Delta Goodrem who has signed up for her sixth season on the show, with Sonia Kruger also back on board as host.

Seal's return has been announced as part of Nine's wider programming plans for next year, with the network promising its biggest focus yet on local content and largest ever local production budget.

Goodrem, speaking from Perth where she is currently on tour, said she welcomed the return of Seal, the hugely popular coach who first appeared on The Voice in its first season in 2012.

"Seal has been a part of it since the inception and I can't wait for him to get back in his big red chair," Goodrem said. "After coming from a win on The Voice this year [with her act Alfie Arcuri], Seal has won it the two years he was on the show so it will be a big challenge to come up against Seal again, but I'm truly looking forward to having my friend back."

There's no word as yet as to the identity of the other two coaches, but Goodrem said she welcomed her chance to return to the show.

"From day one, there was just something in the air that felt really special about it," she said. "It felt like we were all together, between the crew, between the network, between us coaches that are artists that have lived and breathed music our whole lives, we felt like we had the one intention to really bring light to music in Australia."

The network is promising 500 hours of locally produced entertainment viewing with 50 hours of local drama, with a rough and ready focus across the board.

Nine's biggest punt is on what it says will be it's number one family entertainment show for next year. Australian Ninja Warrior, a long-running Japanese format being brought here for the first time, will be hosted by the AFL Footy Show's Rebecca Maddern and features a "fitness elite" competing on the toughest of outdoor sports courses.

Host Maddern said she expects it to be an exhilarating show. "I am so delighted to be a part of it – it is everything that I love – it is sport, entertainment and this is family friendly viewing. The family is going to gather around the TV and be a part of it," she said.

Its 250 contestants, drawn out of a pool of 3000, are shortly to begin filming on the show's 'Ninja Island', an undisclosed location.

Nine is also attempting a fresh take on a food show with Family Food Fight where multi-generational families will compete for the title of Australia's greatest food family.

Karl Stefanovic is to front an "inspirational" new series titled This Time Next Year, where everyday Aussies attempt to achieve huge personal goals.

At first glance it seems an uneven offering, with participants pledging resolutions ranging from the monumental such as a man committed to losing 100 kilograms and a mobility impaired person who wants to climb the Sydney Harbour Bridge, to the superficial such as getting a boob job.

Other familiar figures on the schedule will include Hamish Blake and Andy Lee, who return to Nine with a new series, details of which remain under wraps.

Other new reality shows include The Last Resort: Love Me or Leave Me, where five couples at breaking point head to a relationship bootcamp on a tropical island.

Returning will be the controversial Married at First Sight, which will double in number next year to pairing 10 couples.

In line with other networks, Nine is continuing the trend for biopics with the House of Bond miniseries telling the colourful story of businessman Alan Bond, starring Ben Mingay, Rachael Taylor and Sam Neill.

Underbelly is making a return, but focussing entirely on Mark "Chopper" Read in Underbelly Files: Chopper, the franchise revisiting the character it previously portrayed in 2009's Underbelly: A Tale of Two Cities.

Also returning is Doctor Doctor, getting its second season next year, alongside Here Come the Habibs, Love Child and House Husbands.

The Block – which has its grand finale on Sunday – will also be making a return.

Missing off the roster for next year so far, however, is Australia's Got Talent, which has seemingly been put out of its misery after eight seasons, and Reno Rumble, which died in the water earlier this year.

Other new offerings include Travel Guides, where ordinary Australians act as travel guides trying out the same long-haul and domestic trips with mixed results.

A true-crime series, Murder Calls, is also on the cards and revisits Australian cases and the investigators that took them on.

Richard Wilkins is also to present a new entertainment show The A List, featuring in-depth interviews with famous names.