How to Listen to Internet Radio Station in Your Car

Listen to streaming internet radio in your car using your cell phone. You can listen to many national and international radio stations.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Cell phone (iPhone in this example used)
• Cell phone application that will stream internet radio
• Auxiliary-In on your car stereo and 3.5mm audio cable or FM transmitter

1. Basically a smart phone is needed. For this example an iPhone is used but any smart phone that can stream from the internet will work just fine. Streaming from a windows based operating system should be easier than the iPhone since you do not need an application to stream your radio station.

2. Make sure a good data plan is used, for those outside the United States. The kilobytes, that's what you pay for, are just going to break the bank if you do not have the "Unlimited Data" plan. All US AT&T iPhones should have from the start the iPhone data plan and those have the unlimited data package.

3. If you have the iPhone download an app, that's slang for application. Don't download the first best or cheapest app found. There are many out there, some for free and some don't. My pick would be www.WunderRadio.com. They offer the app for Windows, BlackBerry and the iPhone. Many German stations offer an app that streams their station for free.

4. There are a couple ways to connect your phone to the car stereo. There is the option to use your headset connection and the auxiliary-in from your car. The option to use your headset connection is the least of my favorites. This output is already amplified and the car stereo will do this again and you will not hear a clear sound. The favorite connection would be using a dock for the phone that will use the line-out connection from your phone. This signal is low in power and can be used much better by the car stereo. There are docks that charge your phone, have a line out and a FM transmitter that will transmit to the car stereo set frequency. The FM transmitter option is not the best due to static interference and will ruin your music experience. I have the RoadTrip from Griffin Technology (http://www.griffintechnology.com/products/roadtrip). This is not the cheapest, but well worth the money. This has both the line-out connection and the FM transmitter. When using the FM transmitter with this product, there is not a cable mess in your car.

5. This is all you need. Turn on your phone and connect it the car stereo and start streaming your favorite internet radio station.

Tips & Warnings

• This article is very helpful for those like me that tried to contact satellite radio providers asking for more language variety.
• Any country has radio stations streaming online that can be played in your car. Those who already have a smart phone don't need much to listen to their radio station from abroad and don't need to pay any additional subscription.
• This article can be applied to your home stereo or any other speakers.
• When streaming at home with wifi turn off wifi on your iPhone since the iPhone disconnects wifi and your stream will stop after a few minutes to save on your battery.
• If a cellular plan any other than "Unlimited Data" is used, you will reach the limit very fast. This is not recommended if you do not have an unlimited data plan.
• Also, be careful trying to restart the stream while driving. You are distracted from the road.
• If you are traveling for a long distances, you may not have enough cell phone coverage to stream along your way. Streaming needs at least 3G in most cases and should be available in most metropolitan cities.