We know where AM going. But what comes next?
Anyone who even vaguely follows radio-related news knows that commercial AM radio broadcasting is in its twilight. If it seems every month another AM station goes dark, it’s not all in your head. From 2023 through 2025, the number of licensed AM stations fell by 102. Some were very well known legacy stations that served their communities for generations. Others were AM/FM combos that dropped the AM but continued programming on FM. Lastly, a few are “temporarily” off the air due to technical problems, storm damage, or other issues. Whether or not they will ever come back is in question. Many of them likely will not.
Even many stations that are active and presumably successful are watching industry trends and don’t like what they see. In short, it’s getting harder and harder for AM radio stations to justify staying on the air. The decline of AM broadcasting has been covered ad nauseam. But no one seems to be asking the obvious: If commercial AM radio is dying, what comes next? Can the 540-1700 kHz band be repurposed and given new life? We’re going to have that discussion right now.
The road is treacherous. Few will try. Even fewer will survive.
I spent a great deal of time trying to figure out how many new commercial AM radio stations have appeared on the dial recently. “New” is defined as a brand new, never before existing AM station. Not a transfer of ownership, not a technical change, not a consolidation, rebranding, spinoff, or move to a new physical location or frequency. The number is shockingly hard to determine.
Starting up a new commercial AM radio station is not at all like getting a ham radio license. One cannot simply apply for an AM broadcast license at any time, pay a small fee, and be on the air in a matter of days or weeks. Prospective broadcasters can only apply when the FCC opens a permitting “window”. The process after that can take years. The last general filing window was in 2004 and no credible authority believes another window will open soon, if ever.
Back in 2004, 460 individuals and organizations filed 1311 technical proposals. Some of those proposals were for changes to existing stations, and many parties filed more than one request. Some applications were dismissed for assorted reasons; others were withdrawn by the applicants themselves.
The number of new construction permits issued from that filing window, as best I can tell, is 140-180. Out of that group, most stations were never built. A firm number is hard to pin down, but my research revealed only 20-25 of those 140-180 permits ultimately became a new, functioning, AM radio station. FCC records are labyrinthian. Information is peppered all over the database and has to be pieced together; at times I found conflicting data. The process took quite a while and I never did find a precise “here is exactly what you’re looking for” answer.
When deaths exceed births, population collapse is a certainty.
What we can determine with little effort is the number of active AM radio stations in the USA is falling rapidly. In December 2015 there were 4684 operational AM radio stations. By the end of 2025, the number dropped to 4342. What is more telling is the acceleration of decline. Between December 31, 2025 and June 30, 2026, 42 stations went off the books. That may not sound like a lot, but between 2015 and 2025, 342 AM stations went off the air, or an average of about 34 per year. That means in just the first six months of 2026 the annualized rate of station loss is already more than double the 2015-2025 average. If this pattern continues, the closures portend a bleak future for commercial AM radio.
The number of AM stations permanently going off the air is significantly greater than the very few that became operational as a result of the 2004 application window. Even if the FCC did open a new opportunity, would anyone be interested? There are already dozens of existing stations for sale. Buying one, while not simple, is far less complicated and much faster than starting from nothing. Why would anyone jump through bureaucratic hoops for years when they can comparatively quickly buy an operation that’s already established?
The very last AM radio station born in the United States.
I went on a quixotic journey to identify the “newest” and likely last AM radio station to go on the air in the USA. It sounds like it should be an easy task, right? Believe me, figuring it out was not at all easy. The FCC databases are ocean-wide, canyon-deep, and not straightforward. After countless hours navigating FCC documents, it turned out the best leads came not from federal records but from media and trade organizations.
The last known new AM radio station to go on the air is…drum roll…KKXA AM-1520 in Snohomish, Washington. It began broadcasting on October 11, 2011. Any Off Grid Ham reader who can provide credible evidence of any new (never before existing) commercial AM station going live on air in the USA after 10-11-11, should contact me immediately. I am extremely confident no one can bust me on this. I challenged three separate artificial intelligence chatbots to try and they all failed.
It surprised me the last AM station wasn’t an obscure, 250 watt “peanut whistle” in a small rural town. Instead, it was powerful 20,000 watt daytime/50,000 watt nighttime signal serving the Seattle area. It’s sad I could find no record of any new AM radio stations beginning operation after KKXA. We can partly attribute that to the FCC for not opening any licensing opportunities, but a basic truth of capitalism is at play here: if there was truly a demand, the supply would follow.
What should be done with the 535-1705 kHz band?
Before we go further, a really important caveat is that the AM radio band is governed by international agreements. No signatory government can unilaterally repurpose this band in a manner that violates these long-standing agreements. Large scale restructuring would require cooperation from numerous other countries.
The well documented decline of commercial AM radio plainly demonstrates that in its current iteration it has no meaningful future. But we can’t just leave it there. I don’t hear anyone asking: What’s next? What should we do with the frequency band? I have a few ideas:
Leave it as a dead, largely empty band.
This undesirable option may be surprising but it’s not a novel idea. Except for a few scattered holdout stations and low power operators, AM broadcasting has for all practical purposes ended in most of Europe, more or less relegating AM to what is functionally a ghost band. The USA could do the same. As more stations go dark, the FCC simply lets attrition run its course. With thousands of stations still active, this would take a very long time.
Extend the 160 meter ham band.
The bottom of 160 meters is 1.8 MHz. The top of the AM band is 1.705 MHz. It would seem like a natural fit to move the lower limit of the band down a few hundred kHz and give us amateurs more space; perhaps open it up to Technician class licensees to encourage use.
Reallocate it to data, telemetry, and similar services.
This is the least feasible option. Due to physical and engineering limitations, antennas and transmitter power levels needed to make the AM radio band useful for high-speed data or cellular communications are impractical. However, it’s not impossible and yet-undeveloped technologies could open the door.
Establish a non-profit community broadcast band.
This idea is Number One on my wish list! The FCC could establish a new type of license for individuals and non-profit groups to open their own broadcast radio stations. The technical and legal barriers should be low enough that small-time operators on modest budgets would have a real chance of getting on the air. At the same time, there must be enough oversight to maintain the integrity of the service and filter out unserious “trash” operators. We already have CB for that! I propose 500 watts daytime/100 watts nighttime power limit, perhaps a higher daytime limit in sparsely populated areas, with simple wire antennas allowed. Best of all, the FCC could implement this new service while remaining within the boundaries of established international treaties. It would still be AM radio broadcasting, but with a different licensing structure.
PUBLIC DOMAIN IMAGE
What I think will likely happen.
Anything that involves changing international treaties is almost certainly a non-starter. The diplomatic hurdles and getting every concerned party to agree on a single policy are a “moon shot” that could take many years to finalize. During that time, political leadership changes, priorities change, alliances change, and technologies change. Renegotiating treaties is not impossible, but wow, the bar is breathtakingly high.
Another plausible scenario is the USA is left with powerhouse stations in large cities while the smaller outlets get choked out. The economies of scale apply to radio, too. One big signal is more efficient than several small ones. At the other end, small markets may not support a local station, but a strong station from a distant large city can fill in the gap with no extra expense.
After many, many hours of deep reading and research, I believe in the short term (within ten years), the FCC will unofficially allow a hybrid version of the European path. They will not outright force a shutdown of AM radio as some European countries did, but the FCC will let the band lay fallow as stations organically end operations. As badly as I want to see some kind of community radio fill the space, realistically that’s unlikely to happen.
Passively letting AM die is effortless and has the least political and regulatory friction. A few commercial broadcasters will always remain. I highly doubt they will ever drop to zero, at least not in my lifetime. And the FCC, I hope in my lifetime, creates a non-profit community AM broadcast license class.
Ghosts from the halcyon days of commercial AM radio are like electromagnetic waves that no one can see or touch; they mean nothing unless they are received and understood. I don’t want to see over a hundred years of rich history forgotten and a legacy become lost. Let someone else plant seeds in that fallow ground and make it bountiful again.