The big question; how bad is it?
The short answer; Not terrible, not great.
Short summary in a chart:
| Service | Licenses Canceled | Licensed and Silent | Comment |
| Full Power AM | 812 | 105 | Since 1991* |
| Full Power FM | 517 | 88 | Since 1991 |
| Low Power FM | 502 | 51 | Since 2005 |
| FM translator | 1677 | 138 | |
| FM Booster | 165 | 11 | Since 1991 |
*1991 was the peak number of AM licenses. It also marks when the FCC record-keeping began tracking the license status of all services.
There are 10,846 full-power FM stations, 8,374 FM Translators, 1,910 Low-Power FM stations, and 373 FM boosters currently licensed as of this writing.
According to the FCC data, the peak number of AM stations occurred at the end of 1991 with a total of 4,985. As of August 2024, there are 4,303 stations. There are 105 AM stations licensed and silent.
AM station licenses are being surrendered to the FCC at an increasing rate in the post-Covid era. I like charts. It is fun to look at raw data sorted in different ways. Fortunately, the FCC’s license management system allows one to search for various categories e.g. “Full Power AM” and “License Cancelled.”
Here is a chart by year of the number of AM station licenses surrendered to the FCC:
| Year | Licenses surrendered | States | Comment |
| 1992 | 1 | AR | |
| 1993 | 2 | FL, MS | |
| 1994 | 1 | GA | |
| 1995 | 0 | ||
| 1996 | 41 | SC, VA, GA, KY, LA, FL, NC, TX, CA, OK, AR, MT, KS, AL, PA, TN, MS, IL, MN, FL, MI, UT, ME, IA | FCC 96-218 rulemaking |
| 1997 | 33 | SC, NY, CT, AR, GA, LA, NJ, AL, VA, FL, ME, AZ, MS, MD, CO, WV, MI, CA, NC, SC, TX, VT | FCC 96-218 rulemaking |
| 1998 | 9 | PA, NC, MO, CA, WV, TX, CT, AL | |
| 1999 | 11 | CA, PA, LA, IN, NM, VA, NY, MD, TX, WI | |
| 2000 | 6 | FL, CA, VA, WV, PA | Dot-Com crash |
| 2001 | 12 | IA, NC, SC, IA, AR, ND, CA, VA, RI, OK, OH | |
| 2002 | 14 | MI, GA, TX, PA, IA, MI, AR, AK, KY, MS, MP (Northern Mariana Islands) | |
| 2003 | 15 | CA, AK, MI, PA, MS, ME, CO, GA, KY, AL, CO, VA | |
| 2004 | 34 | NC, GA, CO, MS, SC, PR (Puerto Rico), LA, MI, OH, TX, FL, AR, CA, UT | |
| 2005 | 11 | TX, GA, CA, AR, IA, PA, MI, OR | |
| 2006 | 16 | TX, PA, AR, MI, OR, MS, IL, MN, OK, WA | |
| 2007 | 9 | GA, AR, TN, OR, VA, TX, MA, MO | |
| 2008 | 4 | FL, MI, PA, AL | |
| 2009 | 7 | MI, IL, OK, OR, LA, ID | Sub-prime mortgage crash |
| 2010 | 7 | NY, VA, TX, PA, AL, WV | |
| 2011 | 32 | MS, AL, GA, VI (Virgin Islands), MD, MI, AS, TX, AR, IN, FL, TN, SC, NM, IA, NY, PA, LA, VT, NC | |
| 2012 | 25 | MS, FL, LA, TX, DE, KY, TN, IN, AL, GA, OH, PA, IL, MS, NC, MI, UT, SC. FL | |
| 2013 | 20 | MS, PA, OR, AL, MT, OK, TX, SC, NV, NM, NH, GA, TN | |
| 2014 | 22 | SC, CO, AK, AS (American Samoa), IL, AR, PA, RI, GA. IN, MA, MI, TX, NY, MS, WY, AL, MT, VA, LA, MO | |
| 2015 | 21 | AR, GA, WI, AL, NE, NV, HI, SC, NY, UT, MO, TN, KY, MA, IL, AR, AL, AK | |
| 2016 | 22 | DE, SC, HI, WI, MS, AL, OH, NV, MT, GA, NY, MO | |
| 2017 | 19 | NC, KY, CT, MO, GA, IL, TN, WY, NY, CA, OH, NH, PA | |
| 2018 | 18 | MD, KY, GA, NC, IL, GA, MS, UT, VA, LA, NY, MT, AR | |
| 2019 | 33 | AL, SC, OR, AR, TN, NC, WY, IN, KS, HI, WA, AL, IL, KY, HI, VI, VA, GA, LA, CA | |
| 2020 | 60 | MO, NE, FL, GA, LA, ID, TX, MP, AR, AK, KY, IL, AL, NJ, TN, MI, SD, MS, VA, CO, OH, SC, NM, WI, ND, AZ, OR, MD, PA, NV | Covid-19 crash |
| 2021 | 46 | MI, FL, AL, NV, GA, NM, PA, AZ, IN, OH, TX, IA, OR, CA, VA, IL, TX, TN, CA, NC, LA, OR, AZ, MS, SC, WV, WA, PA | |
| 2022 | 21 | FL, MS, AR, VA, MT, NY, KY, TN, SC, ME, NC, NM, MO, TX, GA, VT, PA | |
| 2023 | 188 | TX, SC, MI, CA, ID, IL, OR, MD, MA, NM, AR, FL, KY, OH, TN, NC, LA, AR, CO, ME, MS, GA, WA, MI, OH, PA, VA, NJ, WI, NY, HI, NH, UT, IN, MT, SC, WV, IN, GU (Guam) | The Great Cancellation of May 4, 2023 |
| 2024 | 35 | VA, AL, ME, LA, NC, MO, NY, SC, AZ, IL, NM, NV, WA, FL, TX, IN, WY, WA, KS, CA, MA, OH, NJ, AR, GA, CO, PA, VT | As of August 2024 |
A couple of things to note; there seems to be a two-year lag between any major economic downturn and a mass surrender of licenses. Covid-19 appears to be the exception. When the shutdowns came, clients canceled their advertising in mass causing a rapid end of already teetering businesses. In 1996, the FCC changed the rules on silent stations, limiting the time allowed to be silent to 12 months, after which the station license was canceled.
In 2023, the FCC performed a bit of housekeeping, canceling 188 AM expired station licenses some of which had been expired for decades. They performed the same thing for the FM band in October.
While every state and territory has at least one surrendered license, some states have more than average. Those tend to be mostly in the south; Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia, Florida, Mississippi, South Carolina, and Kentucky.
Too many AM stations these days are dead men walking. It takes effort to keep an AM station on the air. Maintenance of antenna arrays, particularly directional systems, is expensive. Selling advertising is much more difficult than it is for FM stations. Local programming is expensive. The land under an AM tower is often worth more than the license itself.
Land within certain city limits is a ripe target for developers. As more pressure mounts on station owners (taxes, zoning, etc) how long can they last before the inevitable happens?
Then there is the aging audience problem and in many smaller operations, the aging owners problem too.
The transition to digital modulation never happened. There are no AM stations running hybrid (MA1) HD radio. There are three AM stations that I know of that are running the all-digital (MA3) version of HD Radio.
In spite of those things, AM continues on.
Perhaps one reason; AM equipment is fairly simple in design and ease of use. Take away the electrical noise problem and it works well. AM radios are still ubiquitous in most houses, cars, hotel rooms, etc.
Many AM stations now have an FM translator, which is especially helpful if the AM station has to sign off at sunset or greatly reduce power. Some AM stations are simulcasting with full-power FM stations.
Are there any technological developments that would solve some of the issues facing AM broadcasters? More economical yet still efficient antenna designs that save space? A different modulation scheme that is still compatible with full-carrier AM and will work with older receivers (9K5R3E)?
Those question will likely remain unanswered. The FCC has shown no interest in allowing experimentation on the Medium Frequency band.
It’s no secret that AM is teetering on the edge, especially when mom ‘n’ pop operations and small owners are having a tough go of things. Engineers Dennis Jackson, Bob Gilmore and I re-lit WADS in Ansonia, CT just hours before the station’s license was to expire as they were on a silent STA. With budget concerns along with losing their transmitter site it makes things difficult, especially when land owners find the land more valuable than whatever lease agreement is in place with the AM broadcaster.
I recently chronicled the day we brought WADS back to life on my site in the forum thread Saving A Licensed AM Station With 10 Watts.
Bill, that is an interesting story. What will WADS be doing now that it is back on the air?
HDRadio … so sad. DXers hate it because in MA1 mode it’s so wide. But as I point out to my fellow MWDXers, stations aren’t there for you, they are there for the advertisers and to get ears to those advertisers you need good programming that sounds good. HDRadio lets you do that. But honestly? I think a lot of CEs feel the same way DXers do!
Of course there is the expense, too.
But it sounds so good! The only one I can decode, and only at night, is WPHT-1210 in Philly. I don’t care for their programming choices, but it sounds darn good. When I lived farther south, I could get as many as 10, a few during the day. One by one, they turned off their encoders starting in 2019. By the time we moved last year, KRLD-1080 in Dallas was the only one I could get with any regularity. Sad.
Paul, I’m afraid not much. We were brought in to resuscitate the license from expiring from a silent STA. The fact that the station is back on the air is only temporary, especially with a relatively untuned longwire antenna in addition to being only 10 watts. The licensee is apparently cash-strapped but insists on keeping the license. Personally, I don’t see anything short of a miracle being able to save the station for the long term.
I wish there were more of a coordinated effort to really evaluate the viable AM outlets vs the nearly-dead ones, and push the latter to hand in licenses in a way that might allow for better signals for the former. Changing freqs, patterns, power, SOMETHING. I suppose even just killing off a bunch of stations on the graveyard channels might make the remainder a lot more listenable at night.
I think of the old Broadcast Maximization Committee that actually did the work and figured out how to migrate **every single existing AM station in America** over to DRM-based digital signals occupying the TV5 and TV6 frequencies. Impressive stuff.
Aaron, You bring up some good points! Much of the low band VHF TV frequencies (Channel 2 through 6) are empty or emptying out because ASTC 1 (and 3) does not work as well on those frequencies.
Certainly, many viable AM stations would benefit from either cleaning up the MF band or moving to a new location with DRM modulation scheme. Sadly, the FCC seems more interested in selling spectrum to the big mobile data corporations than in having a viable broadcast media serving the public interest.
“ATSC 3.0 can handle 100 audio channels along with TV”.
With “0” Zero receivers unless you count the 3.0 TV devices.
*LG has ceased including ATSC 3.0 in their lineup.
Bill, ATSC 3.0 has effectively been killed off at least for now. It was promising, but poor decisions by various players have halted development.
It broke my heart when WAZX (1550) 50KW daytimer Smyrna/ Atlanta went dark. I thought it had so much potential especially in a top ten market. The owner sold the land out from under it. (Now, you would think Atlanta has enough shopping centers and apartments.)
It started out as a religious station, then Hispanic, then was purchased by a Korean businessman who planned to make a Korean station. Problem was the Korean market was on the other side of town. It was on and off for 10 years playing nonstop oldies. Finally he sold the license and equipment to a Hispanic religious group who are looking to re-locate it. Atlanta has poor ground conductivity due to the clay soil beneath it. What are insulators made out of? Ceramic. And what is ceramic made out of? Clay.
I fondly remember The Great 208 – Radio Luxembourg – on 1440kHz, with a quoted 1.3MW e.r.p. They got the audio processing just right. Tight, punchy and clear. AM radio can sound great, but I am well aware that’s not enough to ensure survival in a developed market.
Commercial realities aside, is there any discussion Stateside of keeping a minimal AM broadcast provision for use in emergencies? This is ostensibly more feasible here in the UK, with vastly less area to cover, plus our dinosaur TX on LW at Droitwich.
Our digital domain programme distribution network is vulnerable to attack, as are our Internet and cellphone networks. Not to forget the havoc which Nature can wreak!
As mentioned above, AM receivers are still plentiful and still being made & sold. They just might have one vital purpose left in them.