A plain guide to how licensed over-the-air radio and online streams differ—without turning into a law-school lecture.
In the United States, terrestrial radio stations operate as FCC-licensed facilities with coverage contours, ownership rules, and public-interest obligations that evolved over a century. Online streams of those same brands are distribution layers: convenient, portable, and sometimes geo-affected, but not the same legal object as the tower.
For you as a listener, the hybrid habit is already normal—FM in the car dock, stream on earbuds at the gym. This directory organizes public stream references and station profiles; it is not the licensee and does not replace official station apps when brands prefer them.
Practical tips: keep two paths to the same format in Favoritos, browse radios when one path fails, and use regiones to understand which signal is actually local to you.
Streaming quality depends on your network more than on the FCC. Terrestrial quality depends on topography and radio frequency interference. Choose the tool that fits the moment.
When you want editorial news rather than music, noticias still applies on either path. Format discovery lives in géneros; popularity clues live in Top.
Questions about a listing? Contacto. Understanding the terrestrial/stream split makes outages less mysterious—and makes you a sharper directory user.