Times Radio - Listen Live 12+

I have enjoyed listening to Times Radio since it first came on the air in 2020. I find the range of topics covered on the station keeps me well informed on the modern world and sometimes history.

Some of your presenters are top class. The ones I listen to most, Matt Chorley and Mariella Frostrup I particularly enjoy, listening to.

I like the columnists from the Times being involved in the programs, there are some excellent contributions. It brings the quality of the paper to the airwaves.

Some of the adverts are very repetitive and kept on the station for so long that they become very annoying. You might say putting you off what they have to offer!

One of my pet hates are the McDonald’s adverts. Not only are they repetitive but also, I believe, give misleading information about their commitment to healthy food. The adverts are in direct contrast to much of the radio stations coverage of health issues, particularly obesity.

I understand that there have to be adverts to fund the station, but perhaps the Times ought to be more selective about who it chooses to advertise. For me, the advertisers and the Times should reflect the same concerns regardless of the commercial value that a particular advertiser could bring to the station.

This app is great for listening to live shows. I have sometimes used this app for catch up listening, particularly in the evening when I go to Jane and Fi’s programme from the afternoon. However, one massively annoying thing is that in a two hour programme, one gets the last minute or so of the end of Mariella Frostrup’s programme which precedes them, but then lose the last part of Jane and Fi; often this means either they, or someone they are interviewing just before 5pm is cut off!!! It’s downright infuriating. Surely it cannot be that difficult to sort out so one hears the whole of the programme one has chosen to listen to?Also, if you want to listen to a whole show, you cannot as it’s broken into segments and you need to play each one individually- very annoying! And the adverts! Well it is a commercial station so guess they have to be expected. However, they have a few companies which seem to be heavily invested in the station so those adverts are repeated regularly. And often- to the point where I can probably recite the one for a well known travel company. As for the adverts where the speak so fast at the end to say their Ts & Cs… we’ll that’s when I want to throw the radio out of the window. Love Stig and Asmaah in the morning- great pairing with them. Rest of programmes tend to be very samey.

The station is great, really enjoyable and engaging, but they seem determined to make listening almost impossible. After nearly a month we still can’t play it directly through Google Home - it still plays X Radio instead; also, you can’t cast from within the app so as an iPhone user I can’t cast it and therefore hear if I move away from my phone. Additionally, you can listen to shows that have already broadcast, but only if you stream as you listen, which I can’t do as I usually work in remote areas without WiFi or any signal at all. It’s not so good I’m prepared to bust my data allowance listening to earlier shows in the rare event I have 4G - why can’t I download them at home to listen to while out? When you open the app it will be stuck on the last show you listened to, even if that was live and no longer broadcasting, you have to shut down the app and re-open it to get to the correct show. And why can’t I rewind a show to listen to a bit again or that I may have missed? Come on, Times, you had both the time and the resources to make more than a perfunctory app, albeit a very pretty one. Get your act together or I will very soon be a former TimesRadio listener - I just don’t need to work so hard to be entertained when there are so many very good podcasts so readily available.