Studio at KCNL in San Jose (Photo: J. Waits)
The FCC just released its quarterly list of the total number of licensed broadcast stations in the United States. Based on their statistics through March 31, 2012, the number of licensed broadcast radio stations is still on the rise, continuing the trend that we saw in last quarter’s update.
Based on this list, there are more radio stations today (15,029) then there were a few months ago. The number of FM commercial stations and FM educational stations increased since the end of December, 2011. The only categories in which there was a decrease in the total number of radio stations were AM stations, FM translators/boosters and Low Power FM.
By the end of March, 2012, there were 77 more FCC licensed radio stations in the United States than there were at the end of December. FM educational stations (college radio, high school radio, public radio, community radio, and religious broadcasters) picked up the most stations and increased by 68. By the end of March there were 8 fewer LPFM stations and 2 fewer FM translators/boosters.
As of March 31, 2012:
AM Stations: 4,762 (down from 4,766 in Dec. 2011)
FM Commercial Stations: 6,555 (up from 6,542 in Dec. 2011)
FM Educational Stations: 3,712 (up from 3,644 in Dec. 2011)
Total Radio Stations: 15,029 (up from 14,952 in Dec. 2011)
Not included in Total Radio Stations:
FM Translators and Boosters: 6,097 (down from 6,099 in Dec. 2011)
Low power FM: 830 (down from 838 in Dec. 2011)
