A radio format or programming format describes the overall content broadcast on a radio station. Radio formats are frequently employed as a marketing tool, and constantly evolve.
List of radio formats
- 80s Hits
- Active Rock
- Adult contemporary (AC)
- Adult standards/Middle of the road (MOR)
- Adult Album Alternative (or just Adult alternative) (AAA)
- Album oriented rock (or Adult oriented rock) (AOR)
- Alternative rock (or just Alternative)
- Beautiful music
- Big band
- Black gospel
- Blues
- Canto-pop (Cantonese pop music)
- Caribbean (reggae, soca, merengue, cumbia, salsa, etc.)
- Children's Radio
- Christian
- Classic country
- Classic hits
- Classic rock
- Classical
- Comedy
- Contemporary Christian
- Contemporary inspirational
- Contemporary hit radio (CHR)
- Country
- Dance
- Easy listening
- Educational
- Electronica
- Ethnic
- European Hit Radio (EHR)
- Freeform (Disc jockey-selected)
- General service
- Gospel
- Hindi film music
- Hot adult contemporary (Hot AC)
- Hurban/CHR (bilingual Hispanic youth format)
- Jazz
- Modern adult contemporary (Modern AC)
- Modern rock
- New adult contemporary/Smooth Jazz (NAC)
- New Country/Young country
- Nostalgia
- Oldies
- Polka
- R&B ("rhythm and blues")
- Radio documentary
- Ranchera
- Rap/Hip-hop
- Regional Mexican (banda, corridos, ranchera, conjunto, mariachi, norteño, etc.)
- Religious
- Rhythmic CHR
- Rhythmic oldies
- Rock
- Rock en español
- Romántica (Spanish AC)
- Soft adult contemporary (Soft AC)
- Soft rock
- Soul music
- Sports (Sports/Talk)
- Standards
- Talk (News/Talk)
- Tejano (Texas/Mexican music)
- Top 40
- Tropical (salsa, merengue, cumbia, etc.)
- Urban contemporary (mostly black rap, hip-hop, soul, and R&B artists)
- Urban adult contemporary (Urban AC) (black R&B, soul and sometimes gospel music, without rap)
- Urban oldies
- Variety
- World music
The following are less formats that programming philosophies that govern the approach taken to serving the listening audience. They may have any programming format or a mix of formats.
