Apple Faces Renewed Pressure to Enable FM Radio Chip in iPhones Amid Strong Hurricane Season [Updated]

[Kabeyun]

I have never understood why this was not done a long time ago. Tuners in Phones was a standard practice at one time and made a lot of sense both for when no data link was available, in emergency situations as outlined above and generally for saving data bandwidth. The headphone on these phones always acted as the arial so not sure how this would be handled today in the Apple world where the headset has been removed.

I don’t know either. My first thought is that it’s some tacit agreement with cellular providers.

Hahahaha, Apple will not do that in a million years! Apple will pull all your money no matter what.

FM Radio might hurt Apple Music subscriptions, though. What to do...

Maybe. Fair point, but today people are increasingly used to customizing what they listen to, either coarsely by genre or finely by song. Can’t do that with OTA radio. I don’t see people choosing the whims of the local radio station and their corporate sponsors over personally-tailored on-demand content.

 

[meaning-matters]

Here's why.

 

[Juicy Box]

So when a hurricane hits and there is no power, they want people to use their barely making a whole day battery iPhone, as an FM radio? ok.

There are probably plenty of ways to charge the phone without power. Laptops, cars, battery back ups.

Besides, if there is no cellular available, what would you use that battery for?

 

[tn-xyz]

i love the idea, but apple won't implement FM anytime soon, if ever.
if they did, they'd wait until iOS 1X and sell it as a brand new feature, only available on their latest phone.

 

[joeblow7777]

FM Radio might hurt Apple Music subscriptions, though. What to do...

I really doubt that will make a difference. When have people ever stopped buying music in any format because they have access to a radio, which plays random songs (often repetitively) with tons of ads and talk in between?

 

[Analog Kid]

Best argument in favor of FM that I've heard so far. I never thought I'd care, but this makes a lot of sense.

 

[GizmoDVD]

What good ia a radio when your battery dies? Why can't people just have FM radios?

 

[oneMadRssn]

See article directly below this about Apple Music for why Apple doesn't want to enable FM radio functionality.

 

[ThomasJL]

I like the skeuomorphic design of the radio in the original post of this thread. Seeing good skeuomoprphic design like that really shows how visionless Tim Cook is for copying the stupid and ugly flat design trend that Microsoft started.

The most important thing I want to say in this post is that I wish every single person total safety during the hurricane season.

 

[motorazr]

Last I checked, the iphones chipsets did not actually have an FM radio— is this new in the 8/X?

[edit to fix sentence]

 

[rtomyj]

So when a hurricane hits and there is no power, they want people to use their barely making a whole day battery iPhone, as an FM radio? ok.

Barely?

I used my iPhone 7 Plus for 10 Hours yesterday (music to Bluetooth headphones, hour workout with GPS, texting, lots of email, and internet use) plugged in at 40% battery life. That was with standby being 15 Hours.

This ain't Android, son.

 

[conancn]

It's a shame... I was in completely dark(no power, no cellar/internet whatever) during Irma and luckily found a 5 yr old android phone that came with FM radio.

 

[oneMadRssn]

I think there is more to it than just enabling it. The antenna would likely involve some extra engineering effort. Some devices historically have taken advantage of the headphones, which don't exist on the iphone anymore. Apple also cares about the user experience. They won't enable it if it's going to suck, which it likely would. Even the best FM antennas are pretty lousy.

I had one of those build a radio kits as a kid. Even a bent paperclip is sufficient as an FM antenna. You really don't need that much. Any of the lengths of wire longer than an inch inside the iPhone can double as an FM antenna.

 

[jakebechtold]

FM (and for that matter AM) radio is old technology. It doesn’t sound that great and suffers breakup and interference easily.

What about newer digital radio broadcasting? Can the iPhone support that?

If it's like the FM chip on the Android phones, it's analog FM only. As a broadcaster I would love to see it support HD Radio, but I don't think that will happen due to licensing requirements (which is a different rant altogether that doesn't pertain to this forum)

 

[Analog Kid]

What good ia a radio when your battery dies? Why can't people just have FM radios?

Hey-- trying to muscle in on my post number? I'm the real post #31.

 

[joeblow7777]

FM (and for that matter AM) radio is old technology. It doesn’t sound that great and suffers breakup and interference easily.

What about newer digital radio broadcasting standards? Can the iPhone support those?

I think the issue here is having a reliable source of information and contact with the outside world during an emergency. You know, when you might not have more sophisticated forms of wireless communication. Who cares how it sounds if you just need a way to warn people about the path of a storm or provide evacuation instructions?

 

[iHack13]

So when a hurricane hits and there is no power, they want people to use their barely making a whole day battery iPhone, as an FM radio? ok.

It enables people to listen to news at news time , so they know what's going on. also if there is complete outage they will still be able to listen to an emergency broadcast on all frequencies .

Seems some people got accustomed to first world problems like battery life and other comforts that they can't put themselves in a spot or situation like this one.

Enable the damn FM radio. It's simple as that

 

[miknos]

If you live in an area that might suffer natural disasters, you might just buy a damn cheap radio that lasts days instead of relying on a smartphone.

 

[717]

Are there still any FM stations left? I thought most of them have been fased out, in Europe anyway. Wouldn't AM be more usefull?

 

[dwig]

So when a hurricane hits and there is no power, they want people to use their barely making a whole day battery iPhone, as an FM radio? ok.

I agree. The iPhone with FM radio enabled would be an extremely poor substitute for a dedicated battery operated radio in emergency situations like those experienced in SE Texas and in Florida. Their pitiful per charge runtime makes them of little use in such situations. FM would be nice in general, but of little or no value as an emergency "backup".

Here in the FL Keys (I'm in Key West), we lost power (3 days to 2+weeks depending on location), water (4 days to 1-1/2 weeks), and most communication. The only thing that functioned through the storm and for the following week was POTS landline phones, ADSL internet, and one FM radio station (kudos to WWUS 104.1 FM for staying on the air). All cable (TV, internet, and associated phone service such as Uverse and Xfinity) and all cell phone connections were broken. What power we could get/find/... was better used in more efficient and more critical uses than recharging an overly power hungry smart phone. My two small radios, one using AA rechargeables which lasted a week plus and one with a hand crank, served well without any extra effort other than a little cranking when I loaned my battery radio to a neighbor in need.

 

[RickInHouston]

So when a hurricane hits and there is no power, they want people to use their barely making a whole day battery iPhone, as an FM radio? ok.

Purchase a battery brick for emergencies. They are so cheap, these days. I've had one for years and will charge a phone 3 - 4 times before being drained. I had it charged and ready to go for Harvey. Luckily, we didn't need it.

 

[mfvisuals]

I don’t understand why a selling point to the iPod Nano isn’t enabled on these phones to add functionality. Clearly they have the ability to create a decent tuner application. They even had commercial skip / rewind functions in it.

Ironically, Apple no longer sells the Nano, so it isn't technically a selling point anymore.

 

[jazz1]

FM Radio might hurt Apple Music subscriptions, though. What to do...

FM & AM music content sucks where I live. So Apple and sat. radio are safe here

 

[kidaje]

What the he** Apple, enable the FM module and make a app.

Sincerely
Your customers

Or we will make mr. Orange Tweet about you

 

[melgross]

What’s clear is that Apple has never shown any interest in having FM available on their devices. Whether they don’t think it’s a good idea technically, or whether they don’t want it to interfere with their content sales and streaming I don’t know.

 

[HarryWild]

Apple will not re-instate the FM radio because it would hurt their music steaming business. It would be the end to a lot of Apple mobile devices apps that rebroadcast over the air content.