K-RADIO streams Korean-language talk and music on AM 1660, broadcasting out of Jersey City, New Jersey for the Korean-American community across the greater New York area. It is free to stream right now on Radio Shuffle, anywhere in the world, no account required.
America's First Expanded-Band Station
K-RADIO's frequency has an unusual claim to fame. It signed on December 8, 1995 as WJDM, according to the station's history, becoming the country's first station with regular broadcasting on the newly expanded AM band. That expansion only existed because a 1988 International Telecommunication Union conference authorized ten new AM frequencies above the old band's limit, and congressman Matthew J. Rinaldo pushed language into the Communications Act that let American stations actually use them.
From Children's Cartoons to Korean Talk Radio
The station's format shifted dramatically in its first years. It carried Radio AAHS children's programming through 1996 and 1997, moved into club dance music under the Beat Radio name, then switched to Spanish-language talk and sports under Radio Unica starting in mid-1998. Radio Unica bought the station outright in January 1999, renaming it WWRU a month later. Multicultural Broadcasting acquired WWRU in December 2003 and leased airtime to Radio Seoul, which eventually rebranded as K-Radio, the identity the station carries today under operator New York Radio Korea.
Serving One of America's Densest Korean Communities
The station's home turf has one of the highest concentrations of Korean-Americans anywhere in the country. Korean immigrants began crossing the George Washington Bridge from Queens into Bergen County, New Jersey in the early 1970s, and by the 2010 census Bergen County had the highest Korean population share of any county in the United States, with Palisades Park passing 35 percent Korean and neighboring Fort Lee around 17 percent. Broad Avenue in Palisades Park anchors the area's Korean commercial district, giving K-RADIO a built-in audience that grew up alongside the neighborhood itself.
Listen to K-RADIO Free on Radio Shuffle
Press play above for Korean-language talk and music broadcasting out of New Jersey, streamed free on Radio Shuffle with no account or app needed.