google home devices plays the wrong radio station

[BobbyG]

None of my google home devices will play the correct radio station.  I ask it to play WRAL FM 101.5 Raleigh HD 1 and it plays WRAL FM 101.5 Raleigh HD 2 through tune In.  It used to work  but no longer.  Any ideas?

[scrambledheads]

It does look like whats happening (based on looking at the Nest Hub) is that in my case and possibly others is its trying to guess so for instance I say play "play Radio Six" I can see the screen autocompleting so when I say / it hears "play radio" it autocompletes that to "play Radio two" perhaps on my demographic (I very rarely if ever listen to Radio 2) or something else but then when it hears "six" it removes the word it has autocomplete'd with and replaces it with what I actually said, when it works.

I assume what is happening mostly (as it is mostly if i'm not careful) is its not hearing the last word because it thinks it knows what I'm going to say. What I have started to do is draw out my syllables or leave a small gap between the words. So not how I would talk conversationally but enough for it to not second guess me.

Perhaps that will work for you too

[SaltyCoogee]

I gave this a go with my problem but I still get the station in a different time zone (either a half hour or 2 hours behind). Best I could do to get it in my time zone without using my phone to stream from an app was to ask for another state/region it seemed to recognise (oddly enough not the capitol city). 

[GinaC]

Drawing out my command didn't work for me. But I agree with scrambledheads, I feel it's trying to guess what I want before I actually complete my command. The weird thing is I've NEVER asked for CBC Radio One in London, Ontario, which is what it insists on giving me now, when I live in Saint John, New Brunswick. I wonder if it knows my brother in law lives in London....LOL? That's the only connection I can think of.  So listening on my phone...

[SaltyCoogee]

I agree @GinaC, it seems as though as soon as it picks up the key words it dismissed the rest. That or it really does think it’s 3500km away in Western Australia. Lest restrictions there I guess haha

[SaltyCoogee]

I’ve got the same issue in Australia. No matter which service is used, when I ask it to “stream Triple j Sydney” it plays triple j in the wrong time zone (either ACDT or AWST). I’ve tried asking it to use tune in, iHeart radio and “radio app”. I’ve had a google home for about 4 years now and it’s only started in the last year or so. I bought the google home purely for the radio function. 

[Rachael1]

Oh I am having exactly the same issue here in Canberra - it plays 95.9 Mackay which is an hour behind. I used to be able to get Triple J Tasmania through RadioApp, but now it won’t even recognize me asking for RadioApp, it just says “I don’t know, but here’s what I found” and shows me Google results. So annoying, I purely have the Nest for the radio function. 

[Rachael1]

Actually, @SaltyCoogee, I just Googled the call sign for Triple J Canberra and it was 2JJJ. So I asked Google to stream 2JJJ, but it still played through TuneIn and played the Mackay frequency. Then I tried “Stream 2JJJ using RadioApp” and it has worked. It is using RadioApp and correct time zone - it’s doesn’t specify the frequency though. Now I can just say “Play Radio” when I want it to play through radio app because it reverts to the last settings you used (usually).

[SaltyCoogee]

Oh thanks!! Good to know, I’ll give this a try today. Hopefully google/the ABC can sort out whatever is going on soon. 

[Rlmcd]

I just tried the Canberra trick on radio app and it said ‘okay playing triple j on iHeart radio app’. Soooo frustrating!!! 

[Easyenough]

Play NPR, play 88.5, play wamu radio, play wamu. For several years these keywords all worked from Washington DC. On January 28, 2022, my six Google Minis and my nest hub started playing the HD 2 station, which is a Bluegrass station. The hub shows tunein free, but I don't know what the Minis use. How do I address this issue? 

[Ghagengates]

This started yesterday for WAMU 88.5 for me also. So far haven’t been able to fix it. I’ve tried many ideas already mentioned. Problem not with the station, but with Google. Help??

[MaSto]

Hah, exactly the same here ... WAMU 88.5 worked fine on my GH setup (1 Hub, 2 Minis) for years, and suddenly it's playing some 88.5 Bluegrass station instead of WAMU. Doesn't matter how I call up the station (frequency, call sign)

[Sktkpk]

Same here. Im coming to like the bluegrass though 🙂

[SJS]

This same thing has happened to me.  I never had a problem before asking my google mini to play WAMU NPR.  Now it says it is playing WAMU on Tunein, and I am getting a bluegrass station.  I can’t figure it out.  I have reset the device and it still does not work.

[goosetr]

Same thing with me. Used to just be able to say "play NPR" or "play WAMU" and it was fine, but starting last week I'm only able to get bluegrass on what I think is WAMU HD-2.  

[Quarkjet]

Same issue with wamu. Please help. 

[flashgilbert]

Same issue with WAMU 88.5. It plays 88.5 HD2 through TuneIn. I cannot come up with a workaround, and I just noticed it in the last few days. Hoping an answer comes soon!

[flashgilbert]

Tried it this morning with "Play NPR' and it worked. Fingers crossed we are good to go. Bluegrass was obviously not a replacement for Esther! 🙂

[tommyalanson]

Mine is fixed too - phew!

[Halfway]

I've got a whole house full of nests doing this as well, if I can't listen to wamu, guess I'm switching to Alexa...

[Jng47]

Same issue suddenly playing WAMU. Google home gets worse all the time....

[GeeBee]

I ask Google to play CBC Radio 1 91.3 which is for New Brunswick and it plays CBC Radio 1 London, ON.  It was playing ok on Sunday.  Why isnt it working

[GinaC]

I had that all last week. Then Julia talked about it on InfoMornig because she was getting a lot of calls about it...and it resolved ! But...today...it's baaaack!

[minerjaime]

@BobbyG I was struggling with this as well (for WAMU 88.5 "HD-1" vs. Bluegrass 88.5 "HD-2").

What we've done, which works and is slightly less convenient, is to download the TuneIn app onto one of our phones.

From that phone, we can specifically select which station we'd like.

Then we cast to the Google Home device.

We have confirmed that, once the app is closed on the phone, the Google Home will continue to play it.

[Easyenough]

You can also download the NPR One app (for free) and cast live WAMU, though it's hidden in the navigation. For me, this isn't a good substitute for voice control.

Fortunately WAMU tweeted a couple times recently that they are aware of and are working on the issue.

[tommyalanson]

Same WAMU. I mean, I like Bluegrass and all, but not all. the. time.

[maripathinders]

Same. Used to play standard WAMU now when I say either "Play NPR" or "Play WAMU" it goes to the bluegrass channel (which I think is HD-1)

[Mat_K]

Same issue. WAMU & WHRO keep bringing up Bluegrass. But WHRV is working just fine. Weird.  

[Venjohnson]

Same here, my Google Home plays bluegrass (88.5 HD-2) instead of NPR on 88.5 WAMU. This just started a couple of days ago. 

[Easyenough]

Playing WAMU now works for all my Minis and my hub. Hope it sticks. Thanks for heads up FlashGilbert. 

[SJS]

As of today, it works again!  Not sure what the problem was but it is working now.

[GeeBee]

The situation for Saint John, NB has been resolved this week.  I think it is a Tune-In issue.  Informing your local radio station may help to resolve in your area.

[VKMiddleCove]

Thanks. We have contacted CBC. Hope that they fix it. 

[Rlmcd]

This is happening to me as well - I ask google to play triple j and it plays the Adelaide version when I’m in Sydney. It worked a couple of months ago and now it’s not. 

I have tried all of the fixes in the help article - specifying frequency, using iHeart radio or tuneIn, I even bought a new google nest as our google home was quite old and it’s still happening.

The iHeart radio and tune in apps both default to the correct location on my phone so, as others have said, this is clearly a google issue. 

I know that the workaround is to cast from another device but at that point I may as well use a speaker and return my google nest?? Isn’t the whole value prop that you can just ask google to play things and it will???  

[WillyWonka]

I’m in Canberra and getting the Adelaide thing too when asking the Hub to play Radio National. Started a month or two ago. I only realised when the news came on and I had no idea what they were talking about! Wondering if making ABC aware would help as it seems to have had some effect in posts above. 

[WillyWonka]

Just found this https://help.abc.net.au/hc/en-us/articles/############9967-Having-trouble-streaming-ABC-Radio-on-you...

[SaltyCoogee]

WillyWonka, can you re share the link? It was coming up as page not found. 

[WillyWonka]

https://help.abc.net.au/hc/en-us/articles/############9967-Having-trouble-streaming-ABC-Radio-on-you...

[WillyWonka]

Sorry, I realise that the link I’ve pasted doesn’t seem to work when you click on it. The page on the ABC is called ‘Having trouble streaming ABC Radio on your smart speakers?’ If you want to google it. 

[Rachael1]

At least it is a known problem, but those things they have listed didn’t work for me. What works seems to change all the time too, so I may have found a solution for today: “Stream 2JJJ through RadioApp” but it may not work in a few weeks time 😞