Opera Radio Online: Stations Streaming Opera Live

Published 24 September 2026

You can listen to opera radio online in any browser, with no download and no account: open 72FM, search for a station's name, and press play. Several classical broadcasters run channels that play nothing but opera, and the big public stations broadcast full performances.

Opera all day

• Klassik Radio — Opera — from Germany, with a Pure Verdi channel.
• 1.FM — Otto's Opera House — opera from Switzerland at 256kbps.
• WQXR Operavore — New York Public Radio's opera stream.
• France Musique Opéra — Radio France's opera channel.
• Radio Caprice — Opera — at 320kbps.
• Classicnl Opera — from the Netherlands.
• OperaRadio (MRG.fm) — from Italy.

Full performances on public radio

• BBC Radio 3 — broadcasts complete operas.
• NPO Radio 4 — Concerten — concert and opera recordings from the Netherlands.

Chinese opera

• CCTV-11 — the audio of China's opera channel.
• 听·越剧 — Yue opera.

Opera on the radio

The Metropolitan Opera in New York has broadcast its Saturday matinees on radio since 1931, and in season many classical stations carry them. Classical radio goes further.

Where to start

Most opera stations play arias and highlights rather than whole works, which makes them an easy way in. Italian opera — Verdi, Puccini, Rossini — dominates the airtime; Mozart and Wagner carry the German repertoire; and Bizet's Carmen is probably the most-played French opera of all. A complete performance runs two to four hours, so the full broadcasts on BBC Radio 3 and the Metropolitan Opera's Saturday matinees reward a free afternoon. The Chinese streams are a different tradition entirely: Peking opera, and Yue opera from Zhejiang and Shanghai, with sung dialogue, percussion and stylised voices.

A route in

1. WQXR Operavore, for opera from New York.
2. France Musique Opéra, for Radio France's channel.
3. Klassik Radio — Pure Verdi, for one composer.

For the wider repertoire, classical radio online is next.