Tunin FM iCarRadio Lite review

Although the iPhone is naturally geared towards offering a superlative musical experience thanks to the qualities inherited from its ancestor the iPod, personally speaking we’ve always craved a way of listening to live radio stations as well as the bangin’ tunes stored within our mobile’s internal memory.

Now, thanks to Tunin FM iCarRadio Lite, this is now possible. This app basically turns your iPhone into a digital radio player, seamlessly snatching live audio streams out of thin air and offering you a plethora of different international stations, each catering for a unique sector of the market.

The app is divided into two distinct sections: Genres and All Stations. The former option allows you to browse the available selections via their theme; for example, you can tap Pop for modern music, Rock for the type of tracks that make you want to bang your head like a madman and Urban for those unbearable bass-heavy abominations that seem to clog up the charts these days.

Naturally, it’s not just music that’s on offer here. You can choose from other options such as Sports, Talk, News and even Christian-themed stations. In fact, the amount of choices on display here is truly staggering, so you’re bound to find a station that fits your bill.

Because the audio is streamed and buffered, the quality isn’t fantastic, but it’s perfectly passable if you’re mainly listening to speech. There are two available options – 29K and 128K – with the latter offering the best quality, albeit at the cost of performance.

When running over a WiFi connection you can bump up the quality to 128K without any issues, but if you’re out and about and using a 3G data service, then you’ll probably find that the lower setting is preferable – otherwise the audio stream breaks up far too often, and this can become annoying over time.

Because this is the Lite version of the app, it’s supported by adverts and lacks some of the key features contained within the premium iteration. For example, you can add additional stations if your favourite selection isn’t included. It’s certainly worth considering, although we have to admit that what’s already on offer in the free version more than suits our own personal needs.

The single biggest issue with the app is the amount of time it takes to initialise, but this is forgivable when you consider how many different stations it has to scan for whenever it’s loaded up.

As a free download Tunin FM iCarRadio Lite is simply essential, no matter how much you listen to the radio.