The NPR News app for the iPhone does a pretty good job of helping you find live and on-demand content from public radio stations across the US. But there’s another app for public radio junkies that has a few extra features, including the ability to find stations that are streaming your favorite programs right now.
The Public Radio Player iPhone app lets you find live radio streams from almost 500 radio stations as well as access to a thousand on-demand public radio programs from NPR, American Public Media, Public Radio International, Public Interactive, and the Public Radio Exchange.
One of my favorite features is the ability to tune into live broadcasts of your favorite program. For instance, say you live in New York and you missed Morning Edition this morning. No problem. It’s probably still playing somewhere in the Midwest. Just fire up the app, select the Live tab, and then click on Program to find Morning Edition and the Public Radio Player will show you a list of stations that are currently playing that program so you can tune in live.
There’s also an excellent local station finder that lets you pull up a list of stations within 50, 250, or 500 miles of your current location.
Version 2.1 includes a sleep timer and wake-up alarm, although you’ll need to keep the app open to use these features. While the developers say that version 2.1 was rewritten to improve performance, the one complaint I have about the Public Radio Player is that it does tend to feel a little sluggish when pressing buttons or switching from one menu to another.
The Public Radio Player is available as a free download from the iTunes App Store.
You can find a few more screenshots after the break.
