How to Listen to Internet Radio in Kodi

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Title card for the guide: How to Listen to Internet Radio in Kodi, in amber on black with an equaliser motif

Kodi has a Radio section on its home screen, and it can fill it with thousands of live stations for free. The most dependable way is an M3U playlist loaded through the IPTV Simple Client add-on; radio add-ons and single-station files work too. Everything below works on Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, Fire TV and Raspberry Pi builds of Kodi.

Route 1: an M3U playlist in IPTV Simple Client

  1. Go to Add-ons → My add-ons → PVR clients → IPTV Simple Client. If it is not listed, install it from Add-ons → Install from repository → PVR clients. Some Linux distributions ship it as a separate package instead.
  2. Choose Configure, and in General set the location to Remote path (Internet address).
  3. Paste a playlist address as the M3U play list URL, for example Germany: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/AlonDrilich/radio-playlists/main/countries/de.m3u. There is one for 166 countries and 60 genres on the free playlist site, each with its own address.
  4. Enable the add-on (or restart Kodi). The stations appear under Radio in the main menu, because every entry in those playlists is marked radio="true", which IPTV Simple Client reads as a radio channel rather than a TV channel.

The playlists are rebuilt every week from the open Radio Browser directory, so stations that move servers are picked up without you doing anything.

Your own list

To mix stations from several countries or genres, make one M3U file of your own and point IPTV Simple Client at it with Local path instead:

#EXTM3U
#EXTINF:-1 radio="true",First station
https://example.com/stream-one
#EXTINF:-1 radio="true",Second station
https://example.com/stream-two

Every station page on 72FM shows its stream address with a Copy button, ready to paste into a file like this. How to find a station's stream URL explains the format.

Route 2: a radio add-on

Kodi's official repository has music add-ons for radio: look in Add-ons → Install from repository → Music add-ons. Which ones are available depends on your Kodi version; a Radio Browser add-on, browsing the same directory as 72FM, has been among them. Add-ons are convenient for browsing, while a playlist gives you a fixed, ordered list of stations in Kodi's own Radio section.

Route 3: one station, no set-up

Download a station's one-station .m3u file from its 72FM page into a folder Kodi can see, then open it from Music → Files. It plays like any other file.

When nothing appears or a station is silent

  • No stations under Radio: check the playlist address starts with raw.githubusercontent.com (the raw file, not a web page), and restart Kodi so the PVR client reloads it.
  • One station is silent: the broadcaster may have moved its stream; the next weekly playlist update usually catches it. HLS streams ending in .m3u8 can also fail on some platforms. Internet radio stopped working covers the other causes.

Frequently asked questions

How do I add radio stations to Kodi?

Enable the IPTV Simple Client PVR add-on and give it an M3U playlist address; stations marked radio="true" appear under Radio in the main menu.

Where can I get an M3U radio playlist for Kodi?

Free playlists for 166 countries and 60 genres, rebuilt weekly from the open Radio Browser directory, are on the radio-playlists site linked from this guide.

Why are my radio stations under TV instead of Radio in Kodi?

IPTV Simple Client files a channel under Radio only when its #EXTINF line says radio="true".

Is there a radio add-on for Kodi?

Yes, the official repository has music add-ons for radio; which ones depends on your Kodi version.