BBC Radio 4 - 198kHz - close down date announced

[The Mercian]

Closure date for BBC Radio 4 longwave on 198 kHz will be 26 September 2026 Arqiva (the tx operator) staff have been informed.

It's not yet known if the transmitters will remain on air for the Radio Teleswitch Service after this date, or if that will end at the same time. It could stay on air without R4 programming after this date (as Allouis 162 kHz has) because there are many (thousands) of electricity meters controlled by data transmitted on this frequency.

[autovon]

"Radio 4’s Long Wave (LW) service will close on the 27th June 2026"
https://www.bbc.co.uk/reception/work-warning/news/radio4lw

[Marcy1]

Very sad will miss it I get it here alot on 198 (especially in the winter months)
I see there is a petition to try and keep it open...that would be great! I read it
on LWCA ...I like LW just a real challenge to dx...old school stuff!
73,s Marcy

[The Mercian]

It's been reprived a couple of times before but this time I don't think it will survive.

The BBC don't care - their long-term plans are for internet-only delivered programming for both radio and TV.

Arquiva don't want to replace it either.  My guess is that the site will be a housing estate within 5 years.

It's a few years off yet but there are also plans to close digital terrestrial TV (analogue has long gone) as well. This will cause uproar (hopefully  )

[William Hassig]

I recorded the last several hours of BBC4 on an 8 hour VHS-HIFI tape to rerecord onto a DVD. I accessed from an sdr in England. I got the last 1½ hours including the last shipping forecast and the goodbye announcement at 0000 utc (1am in England and 7pm in Chicago). Now its just a repeating recorded announcement so it's still on for the low speed data on its phase modulated part. 162 is still on in france for the same reason. 

[The Mercian]

Radio 4 on 198kHz LW ceased programming at 1AM, midnight UTC.

Now just a looped announcement informing listeners to retune.

https://youtu.be/dEQ62PkHS80?si=lcVq0FWUcngNeXOu