No real AM or FM radio in the R2

[Oakwood]

"No R2 radios" is not sound cost or engineering based decision-making . Vehicle ownership basics are just being monetized at every turn possible. Hence subscription services. And that roils me up.

Most of this discussion is about entertainment. Some of us are information junkies so capturing NPR via some electronic or devise jury-rigging is just not going to cut it for me And BTW NPR is not the same as our State Public Radio Network. NPR is just one of the many feeds to state public radio. And it sure isn't the same as my local community based radio. Those stations are on EVERY time I get in my car. Music is great there, too, and no ads!

The idea of paying some 3rd party for accessing public air waves is particularly galling because I'm already supporting each of the public air wave sources with monthly donations. Yes, iHeart is free now, but Wiki says their 2018 bankruptcy filing softened the blow of a $20 billion debt. Hmmm.

What this all says about Rivian is simply their monetization of services. Radio, lidar mapping next, insurance. Gee, don't all those data point collectors get a couple doubloons for selling our private data?

I wonder if the ix3 has a radio for the 10%ers.

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[oregonridet]

I missed the details on the NPR discussion. There's no NPR app to stream on the phone? or an NPR app that Rivian could install natively?

Yes, you could stream NPR from the phone. PITA for Luddite spouse though.

 

[Joules Burn]

Many EVs lack AM because the motor interferes with the signal
I'm shocked how many people still use "radio" , I haven't used FM in at least 20 years. It was all the same songs, annoying DJs and ADs even back then

I don't care about CarPlay / Android auto as platform and know that the only reason Rivian doesn't offer it, is so they can sell you a subscription. But Connect+ has zero value. I would happily for C+ if it was on par with what you get free with android auto/carplay looking at you @Wassym

AT least they didn't put iHeart behind the C+ paywall for you FM users, but are really banking on that 5G connection.

Download your audio to your phone, so when you have poor connection you have something to listen too. Seems like a stupid thing to omit when you already have the "i wont buy a car without carplay" audience

My Ford Mach e GTPE had AM/FM radio. My Kia EV6 GT-L FE has AM/FM radio (and CarPlay). They figured out the interference "problem".

 

[Falcon73]

AM Radio works fine in our Lexus RZ450e. The only time interference is noticeable is when charging and even then it's not terrible.

 

[electromage]

I just checked one out at my local Rivian Space and NPR was #1 on the recommended channels. They also confirmed that it supports Bluetooth audio.

 

[VSG]

If Rivian can unfuck the voice assistant, would that make some of this less...hated? If you can just say "Hey Rivian play the XYZ station on iHeart" or whatever?

Yeah that's exactly what you can do. Right now (for TuneIn at least). And that's exactly what I've done for the past 4 years with Alexa, which allowed you to link in all sorts of music services like TuneIn and iHeartRadio.

 

[VSG]

I actually do listen to FM a lot, but I almost always listen to streaming FM over TuneIn (which is free BTW, although if you really want to you can pay a monthly fee). I have been doing this for the past 4 years in my R1T.

BTW, I don't know what crappy stations you guys listen to, but the stations I listen to don't have advertisements. TuneIn adds the "pre-roll", which is like 15 seconds of station identification when you first tune to the station, but that's it. We have had these TuneIn conversations in this forum for many years, so don't take my word, go and try it for yourself.

When there is cell reception, streaming is better than over the air broadcast because:
1) No dead zones.
2) No losing/reacquiring HD FM, with the accompanying quality change.
3) Always in range of streaming. FM stations around here have an effective range of only like 25 miles, so I am frequently leaving the over the air coverage area of the stations I listen to.

When there is no cell reception, FM is super useful, and I will miss it. You can learn a lot about a new part of the country by listening to its local radio stations and watching its local TV stations. If you travel by staying within your own "bubble" of favorite streaming stations, favorite chain restaurants, favorite chain hotels, favorite video apps, etc. are you really experiencing anything new or are you just experiencing the same life at a different location? (Even satellite radio is part of this bubble, because it's the same everywhere.) My notion of adventure is to get *away* from all that, not to drag it everywhere with me ...

There's still an awful lot of the country that doesn't have cell reception. And repurposing my $1000 cell phone to hold my entire music collection (hundreds of gigabytes of stuff not available over any streaming service) to be played over a lossy Bluetooth connection seems stupid. When everything revolves around your phone, that phone is your one point of failure. Q: What would you do without it? (A: Have an adventure.)

 

[VSG]

You know, I don't like the lack of FM radio either, but you all have to stop spiraling out of control.

As the OP says, it's iHeartRadio AND TuneIn. Don't make it all about iHeartRadio.
TuneIn has pretty much every radio station. Even thousands of AM stations, for those who miss AM.

TuneIn has always been available in the R1, so we know exactly how it's going to work in the R2.

Every single radio station mentioned by call sign in this thread IS AVAILABLE on TuneIn. (OK, it's 15 pages of comments, but I think I checked every station that was mentioned, by trying it in my R1T. Most of you don't mention a call sign so that can't be checked.)

All public radio stations / NPR /APR etc. seem to be supported by TuneIn. You're not going to lose your favorite station. I even listen to a number of small, extremely local, college radio stations over TuneIn. Radio is desperate for listeners, and they try hard to make their stations available to wider audiences.

TuneIn has a free tier. You don't need an additional subscription to listen to FM. Rivian is not making you pay for this. I'm not sure what you get if you pay the monthly subscription, but I have used TuneIn to listen to FM radio, for free, for 4 years now in my R1T and I don't have to suffer through advertisements or anything like that. The stations I listen to don't have ads when I listen over the air, and don't have ads when I listen on TuneIn. Just a short station identification "pre-roll" when you first tune into a station.

(However, if your favorite station does have a lot of advertisements, you're not going to avoid those advertisements by listening in through TuneIn.)

 

[RivianRocks25]

It seems then that if you want to be comfortable with a Rivian then the R1S is the one for you. It’s too bad the R2 doesn’t have that feature but the company needs to stay solvent and cater to the 90%.

But 56% still use radio, so it's NOT 90%.

Want to save money, don't lean so heavy into Autonomy+. I like to drive and I'm sure there is more money in those cameras, computers and engineering than putting in a radio. I know with Tesla and the 10 years of lies about FSD this will be a controversial opinion. I would give up self driving(because it does exist yet!) for a radio.

Just give me Comma quality level 2 lane keep and adaptive cruise as that is where the technology is right now.

 

[rfkxyz]

I'll miss native XM vs. AM/FM, but leaving it out seems like an unforced error for a higher-volume, more mass-market vehicle. Oops.

 

[bgg1]

My Ford Mach e GTPE had AM/FM radio. My Kia EV6 GT-L FE has AM/FM radio (and CarPlay). They figured out the interference "problem".

So does my daughter's "Honda" Prologue,which completely surprised me after finding out that my R1S didn't have it because "EVs can't have AM radio because of interference."

 

[Husky]

I just checked one out at my local Rivian Space and NPR was #1 on the recommended channels. They also confirmed that it supports Bluetooth audio.

Thanks, I was wondering if it did.

 

[narmstrong79]

My Ford Mach e GTPE had AM/FM radio. My Kia EV6 GT-L FE has AM/FM radio (and CarPlay). They figured out the interference "problem".

I owned a Mach-E as well, if I remember they added AM in a later update BUT an again I haven't used FM In 20+ years. And maybe listen to AM for an underground college station in the mid 90's. I couldn't careless about terrestrial radio. The fact that in 2026 we're talking about terrestrial radio.is actually funny to me

 

[Jeremy3292]

15 pages on this...how far can we go?

 

[Leesonw]

Thank you all for your thorough answers. I think Tunein was trying to charge me when I downloaded the app onto my phone but, you are correct, I was able to stream it for free on my computer. But, most importantly, all of my local NPR stations were there and available. Phew. Not that this was going to be a deal killer but I was very disappointed. Thanks for clarifying. Now I just have to hope they will deliver the R2 to New Mexico where our nearest service center is 230 miles away.... Please don't respond to that last comment

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