TagStation has just announced that its NextRadio application is coming to South Korea, which basically symbolizes the app’s rollout in Asia, as South Korea will be the first Asian country that this app is available in. This application lets you listen to your local FM radio stations, presuming your phone has support for FM radio, of course, as this app uses your phone’s FM radio chip. Having said that, listening to the radio in this manner has several benefits, even though you can use it even without the activated FM radio chip, read on.
If your phone’s FM radio chip is activated, one of the benefits is the fact that you’ll be able to listen to your favorite FM radio stations even if cellular towers go down, while listening to FM radio stations in this manner also saves battery, as the company claims that your phone will use 3 times less battery and 20 times less data than streaming radio applications. TagStation believes that its app’s success in South Korea will benefit the company quite a bit, as they’ll be able to forge new partnerships and collaborate with world’s largest smartphone manufacturing companies, like LG and Samsung, for example. TagStation also urges smartphone manufacturers to unlock FM radio chips in their handsets, those of them who have not. Unlocking FM radio chips can be a life saver, as it enables smartphones to receive emergency radio broadcasts, and even though most of you probably won’t find much use of this in your lifetime, some of you actually might, so it’s always good to have that option.
Prior to the South Korea expansion, TagStation was focused on North America and Latin America, and after the company succeeded in its attempt, it decided to try its luck in some other markets. Why South Korea? Well, TagStation claims that South Korea has some of the highest smartphone penetration on a global scale, as 71 percent of its population is using a smartphone at least once a month, which gives TagStation a rather huge market to conquer. The NextRadio app is available from the Google Play Store, though as already mentioned, it’s not available in all markets, but, if you live in South Korea, you should be able to download it. Having said that, your phone does not need to have an FM chip activated in order to use this app (as already mentioned), you can always stream FM radio stations instead, as this app supports that functionality as well. This application is free to use, though it comes with ads, and you can download it via the banner down below.