Can homepod play bbc radio stations?

Hi, to play the BBC radio stations you'll need to use a third party app with AirPlay. The HomePod alone will only play the Apple Music station: Beats 1. "Radio AIR" is an app with over 30,000 radio stations including BBC ones : Radio AIR on the App Store . Maxime

Further comment from Andrew Webb, BBC Worldwide VP Product Strategy:

'To expand on Matthew's comments, we do have the ambition to integrate with HomePod and allow our audience access to BBC services, but as yet, we know of no plans to allow third party applications to operate via the HomePod/Siri ecosystem. This is slowly opening up, if you are on the latest version of iOS and you ask Siri for the News, Sport News or Business News you now receive BBC News services. So, we do see a future evolving but we are not privy to their future intentions in this area. There are other considerations other than technical limitations. All BBC content available via 3rd party platforms must comply to the BBC's regulated distribution guidelines to ensure value to the license fee payer.

These are subject to commercial negotiation and often require work from both parties in order to be able to implement. So, the slightly longer answer is, not yet, we do have the ambition though, however there are technical hurdles that need to be crossed and commercial conditions that need to be satisfied.'

This suggests that Apple's support of third party services on HomePod is still very quiet, and the HomePod will have very limited services at launch. It's again encouraging that they are fully aware of the product and are working with Apple in order to implement something in the future, though. But when this occurs is Apple's guess alone.

BBC stations are available, just not quick to find. BBC R6M is in 'alternative', BBC R1 is in 'Top 40/Pop'.

Your iTunes is not the source for HomePod, it is all driven off your Apple Music account - in terms of streaming direct from HomePod with Siri control. You can send anything you want to it via AirPlay.

Hi. If you already use the BBC iPlayer app, it is possible to play BBC radio stations through a homepod. Simply follow the same instructions for using Spotify: https://www.macrumors.com/how-to/homepod-spotify-airplay/

Essentially, you just need to fire up the iPlayer app, then select the homepod as the taget output device.

Hi, now that my home pod has arrived I can confirm that there is no access to any radio stations from Tunein, that includes all the BBC channels, LBC, Absolute etc. A good solution for you would be to buy a Sonos One with Alexa built in or a standard Sonos Play 1 and still use your Echo Dot. Sonos is now integrated with Alexa so wherever I have a Sonos speaker I can just say 'Alexa play BBC radio 2 in the kitchen' and away you go. This assumes that your Sonos speaker is called Kitchen and your Dot is called something else like Kitchen Echo Dot.

Andrew.

A response from Matthew Postgate, BBC Chief of Technology and Product Officer:

'I think the short summary is that we have the ambition to integrate with HomePod but no current plans. We always try to maximise the ways in which our audiences can reach our services but currently HomePod does not provide for the correct integration. It is something we have been talking to Apple about but have no confirmed timescales.'

Thanks for the updates. I received my HomePod on Friday morning. It's a very good wireless speaker, and I am happy with the purchase for all the usual reasons - sound quality, build, size, compatibility with my Apple ecosystem, lack of Google/Amazon device in my house.

However, it will not replace a kitchen setup for me, or many others I suspect (I have a Ruark R1), because, as the whole thread has focussed on, you can't switch on the BBC radio station you like with one command (oral or physical). AirPlay of TuneIn or iPlayer Radio from your iPhone/iPad/Mac is fine at your desk (where I have my HP) as you are able to devote time to choosing sources, switching between them etc with minimal effort or interruption. Once HP picks up those skills - as I'm sure it will, then it becomes a pretty complete solution I think.

In the US the HomePod will stream the BBC Worldservice. The other BBC radio stations so not appear to be currently available. BBC Podcasts such as BBC Radio 4 Friday Night Comedy are available. (The test seems to be whether the stream is available in iTunes Radio.)

If you can access the station on itunes, you will be able to access them on the homepod - BBC isn't available, but other stations such as LBC are available.

Just airplay it to the speaker from a radio app

Apple are being decidedly quiet about this, but I think it's because they know HomePod won't support any 3rd party radio stations at launch. You'll be able to call up Beats 1 and that's it. Which technically puts it way behind competition in terms of services. I'm hoping the BBC and Apple will work together to bring the stations to HomePod, but that may not be for some time. Until then, we'll have to deal with the inconvenience of using an app on your iPhone or Mac to fetch the station and then AirPlay it to the HomePod - nowhere near as convenient as 'Hey Siri, play BBC Radio 1'. I reached out to the BBC for comment on this but they chose not to respond, which either means they have nothing to say or they're working on something - considering BBC iPlayer is available on most of Apple's other devices (including Apple TV).

I have a HomePod on order, but the fact it only plays stuff from Apple Music is concerning and is making me question whether I should click that 'Cancel' button until the services are up to scratch. But I have no doubt HomePod sounds amazing, as all reviews have suggested. It sounds like HomePod could benefit from an App Store of its own (similar to Amazon Echo's Skills store), but we all know how long it took Apple TV to get its own App Store!

It's also curious there is no HomePod section on any of the Apple support pages, or indeed on this forum.

Thanks for updating us, as someone who actually has a HomePod. We’ve previously discussed in this thread that using AirPlay to stream a live radio station from an iOS device is entirely possible. It’s just not as convenient as being able to ask Siri for a certain station.

My HomePod has arrived and I can confirm that the only radio service I have managed to get so far is Beats 1. This is immensely disappointing and while I wait for Apple to fix this, I stream the radio from my iPhone to the HomePod which is pretty simple, as the HomePod/iPhone integration is great.

However, this stops the music if I need to use the phone. Would be much better if you could just play the radio stations direct. As you say Amazon Dot does it seemlessly. Come on Apple!!!

P.S. another absurd thing it doesn’t do is have a simple sleep timer. Ridiculous!

I've purchased a HomePod, like, an hour ago and just got it home!

Really easy to set up, and found every music track we asked it to play, gave us the weather and all other stupid questions that you ask such things.

As regards radio, I was initially shocked to discover you can't say "Play Radio 1" or "Play Absolute Radio" etc and thought, b***er, what am I going to do now, as I listen to the radio *a lot* during the day. HOWEVER, it's simple to do, what you need to do is get the relevant app on your iPhone, then select AirPlay and choose the HomePod. Takes seconds to do and once it's playing, it's no different to if you'd asked Alexa to play the station only the sound quality is PHENOMENAL.