Long Wave service of BBC R4 to close 27th of June 2026

The BBC in the UK recently announced that their Radio 4 service on 198 kHz will finally shut down on Saturday 27th of June 2026 at 00:00 UTC. It will join a list of other radio stations in Europe that have ceased using the Long Wave broadcast band.

In a statement, the BBC said... "Radio 4’s Long Wave (LW) service will close on the 27th June 2026. We will broadcast daily on-air reminders to help everyone switch to other ways of listening.

The company that owns and operates the LW broadcast equipment has confirmed that the system is reaching the end of its life. As LW is an older broadcasting technology, recent years have seen a decline in listener numbers, with the majority now opting for FM and DAB digital platforms. Given these factors, investing in upgrading the LW equipment is not considered a cost-effective solution for licence fee-funded services. "

While most media sources focus on the Droitwich transmitter, BBC Radio 4 operates from three separate locations.

The main transmitter running 250 kilowatts operates from near Droitwick to the south of Birmingham.. This covers all of England and the signal spills over into Ireland, the north of France and Belgium and the Netherlands.

There are two other transmitters on the same frequency transmitting with 25-kilowatts from Burghead and Westerglen in Scotland.

It's very likely that this BBC signal on 198 kHz would have closed years ago if it wasn't for the fact that the signal was being used for switching electricity meters around the country. I covered this in a previous post.

The last few signals on the long wave band that can be heard in Europe are...

153 kHz - Chaîne 1 in Algeria
153 kHz - SRR Antena Satelor in Romania
171 kHz - Radio Méditerranée International in Morocco
225 kHz - Polskie Radio in Poland
252 kHz - Chaîne 3 in Algeria

Outside of Europe, one of the last countries still using long wave is Mongolia where the extra distance of long wave signals is useful for this huge country.

Links...

1) BBC statement on R4 closure on long wave.

Long slow goodbye of BBC Radio 4 on Long Wave...

The Long Wave Band covers frequencies from 144 kHz to 281 kHz and was once a popular band in Europe for broadcasting. Over the last decade or so, these transmitters have been switched off leaving listeners to find an alternative service on the FM band, DAB or online.

One of the big signals on the band is BBC4 Radio 4 from Droitwich in the east of England on 198 kHz. In May of 2023, it was announced that the BBC would stop scheduling separate content for Radio 4 on long wave and this is expected to happen at the end of March 2024.

There is a group lobbying for the continuation of the BBC Radio 4 long wave service and they have a website here... https://keeplongwave.co.uk/. As of mid-March 2024, they had a petition from 3000 people over a period of 8-months.

In September of 2024, the BBC News website had an article about the decline of the long wave band... https://www.bbc.com/news/business-66644709

In that article, a BBC spokeswoman told BBC News that ..."Long wave is coming to the end of its life as a technology," and that "Radio 4 long wave is currently set to continue broadcasting beyond March 2024."

Receivers... One of the key problems with listening to Long Wave transmissions now is the declining number of radios available.

Curry's is a large electrical retailer in the UK and would be an obvious source if say a member of the public was going to buy a radio. Out of the 67 or so radios that they currently have on offer, just one (Roberts Play) has the Long Wave option for listening. As fewer people listen to Long Wave then there is no reason for manufacturers to include it in their newer models which in turn means a declining audience. 

Radio Teleswitch Service (RTS)... One of the primary reasons for continuing BBC Radio 4 transmissions at present (March 2024) is that the signal is used for timing on electrical meters in many domestic households.

This technology was rolled out back in the 1980's & 1990's and allowed simple basic meters to determine what the time was so that customers could make use of cheaper night-rate electricity.

The inside of one of these control boxes shows a ferrite rod antenna for receiving the 198 kHz signal on the Long Wave band.

At present, these old meters are being replaced with modern Smart Meters.

Date of Radio 4 Switch Off???... The Citizen Advice service in the UK offers the following... "You might have been told by your electricity supplier you need to have your radio teleswitch (RTS) or dynamically teleswitched (DTS) electricity meter replaced. This is because the radio frequency it uses to switch between peak and off-peak rates is being switched off.

The radio frequency is expected to be switched off in summer 2025. Ofgem, the energy regulator, currently expects all RTS and DTS meters to be replaced by March 2025."

Octopus Energy is a UK electricity supplier and offer the following more specific information... " The current planned end date for the transmission is the 30th June 2025."

Assuming the current programme of meter replacement stays on schedule then it looks as if the last BBC Long Wave transmission will be at the end of June 2025.

Video... Lewis, M3HHY has a very good video about the Droitwich long wave transmitter site.