You can listen to music, sports, news, traffic and comedy on satellite radio, which delivers crystal-clear, static-free digital signals from orbiting satellites. The two major players, Sirius and XM (now combined as SiriusXM), cover more than three million square miles of the United States with their services and offer hundreds of channels in each category.
The companies have become popular for several reasons, including the fact that traditional AM and FM terrestrial stations aren’t what they used to be and that in some areas of the country you can’t get any radio signals at all. A satellite-based service gives you access to a large number of channels that include a wide range of genres and, because it’s subscription-based, there are no commercials.
Both firms have satellites in space that send programs to your car’s receivers, and they both have a network of ground-based repeaters to boost the signal in urban areas where tall buildings can block the signal. They also use satellite diversity, which means that they have multiple satellites in orbit and if one of them is blocked you can pick up another.
When satellite radio first arrived in cars, GM, Honda, Toyota and BMW were all on board with XM, which had a head start over Sirius because of its earlier license to broadcast. Eventually both firms got placement with other car makers and both went public. Now, a few manufacturers—most recently the 11th-generation Honda Accord—have chosen not to offer satellite radio.
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