Alexa skill Radio Browser - TuneIn alternative

Radio Browser Skill

The Alexa Radio Skill with your own favorites list.

Select stations from a database of 27,000 entries.
Listen to Internet radio stations in many languages and from many countries. Select by language, country, keyword or station name.

The selection of stations in the favorites list is done by number, or zapping.
Perfect for foreign Internet radio stations, or for web radio whose names Alexa and TuneIn can not recognize correctly.

Alexa RadioBrowser Skill can also play private HTTP Icecast streams. RadioBrowser is an alternative for TuneIn when it comes to unencrypted HTTP streams. Only a few skills can play internet radio without SSL.

"Alexa Radio Browser" – Immediately starts the last played Internet radio station.

During playback: "Alexa next" or "Alexa previous" - move through the favorites list .

"Alexa tell Radio Browser 5" - Switches directly to the web radio under favorite number 5.

When switching, the name of the station is read out first. After that, the playback starts. However, you also have the option of changing the name or deleting it completely. In this case, the name is not read out, but the playback of the radio stream starts directly. This function is very important for Internet radios whose language does not support Alexa. The station name is first taken from the Radio Browser database when it is inserted. If the name is too long you can shorten it. If the name has unreadable characters, then you can enter a transcription.

Radio stations are added to the Radio Browser Skill from a database. You don't have to worry about the radio streaming URLs. Also the icons of the radio stations are automatically taken over database (important for devices with screen or for the Alexa app).

You can also insert a custom streaming address by hand. e.g. from your own stream that you stream to the Internet from home, or if the desired web radio is not included in the Radio Browser database, but you know the streaming URL.

Alexa Skill Radio Browser Default Station List

Call up specific radio station with a single word

This is also possible with the use of routines via the Alexa app.
Open the Alexa app and select menu item "More" (bottom left).
Click on menu item "Routines."
Via "+" sign (top right) you can create new routine.
At the menu item "when the following happens", please select "Voice" and enter a word or phrase. For example, I entered the word "karamba".
In the menu item "Add action" please take the first entry, "Custom" and enter: "tell radio browser station four".
After the routine is activated, it is enough to say "Alexa Karamba" and Alexa will play the radio station that was stored under number 4.

FAQ

Question: I have entered a radio station. The name is announced, but it does not play.
Answer possible causes:
1. URL is not a streaming address, but address of the webplayer. (Alexa can not play html web pages).
2. URL is a wrong built playlist. Try to download playlist and open it with text editor. It contains correct streaming address.


You can ask me for help via contact form. I will try to find the right radio station address for you. (If I get too many requests, I will delete this message).
I usually answer within 24 hours.

I hope you understand that I did not create the data bank. And of course I could not check all the radio stations for compatibility with Alexa.
Therefore, if you can not listen to the radio station at the first attempt, you need to understand what the reason is.
The easiest way to check the functionality of the URL is to paste the URL into the address bar of your browser.
If the browser's built-in player opens and starts playing the stream, that's a good sign. The built-in browser player looks like this:

If it opens a web page, this is a bad sign. Such a URL will not work in Alexa.
In this case you will need to extract the real address of the stream from this page. How to do this I will describe below.

The second option is that you put the URL in the address bar of your browser and it downloads automatically some file . Most likely it's a PLS or M3U playlist. You can find such a file in your download folder. Open this file with any text editor and you will see real Stream links inside.
Amazon Alexa documentation describes that the Alexa devices can play the following formats AAC, MP4, MP3, PLS, M3U, M3U8, HLS.
But I found that the playlist link PLS works only with my Echo DOT 3. And does not work on my Alexa app in the smartphone and in my TV.
So it still seems to depend on the device what works and what doesn't.

Question: I made a favorite list for Alexa.Worked great for a while.Then it stopped working and and now only plays standard list! Here I can still see my created playlist.

Answer: It happens when the skill is deactivated once and then reactivated. Thereby the skill gets new ID. And the program can't find the playlist in the database anymore.
You can see hier your old playlist. In that case write me via contact form and I will try to restore your playlist.