Final Listen: The First Two TikTok Radios

Update: iHeart’s announcement of a deal to create TikTok radio last week threw the future of SiriusXM’s similar channel into doubt. No announcement had been made when this story was written, but the SXM channel has since been replaced on the dial by its holiday Holly channel, making this a Final Listen.

TikTok is seemingly about the ephemeral, but the first radio station that iHeart Radio built around TikTok, Australia’s TikTok Trending channel, is five years old. SiriusXM’s American counterpart, TikTok Radio, followed nine months after, making it more than four years old.

The SXM channel immediately became a good way to help find the potential radio records among the constant flow of TikTok oddities. Some of those songs emerged because the music emerging from TikTok became more mainstream. Some songs began as the puzzlements of the streaming world and sounded more like radio records with exposure.

SXM’s TikTok Radio was chief among my Intriguing Stations of 2021, although it could have made the list every year. Sometimes it takes a lot to be optimistic about today’s hit music, but when I listen to SiriusXM with the intent of hearing recent music, I usually hear something on either TikTok Radio or Hits1 that keeps me from getting distracted and punching to “Turn the Beat Around” or “Moonlight Feels Right” on 70s on 7.

Both TikTok stations were intriguing in other ways, using the app’s content creators as DJs. Sometimes, in the context of a show like SXM’s Trending 10 Countdown or an artist or creator takeover in Australia, the shows were linear. Often, they were content blocks that just showed up. That was radical in 2021. For better or worse, that’s often what broadcast radio sounds like now.

Monday’s announcement of an ambitious new deal between iHeart and TikTok made no mention of iHeart’s existing Australian channel (perhaps because it’s through partnership with local station owner ARN). It outlines a lot of joint ventures — a podcast network and increased opportunity for TikTok personalities on iHR’s stations — but it also mentions a forthcoming TikTok radio, available both over-the-air and via streaming. As of this writing, there has been no word from either side about SiriusXM’s TikTok Radio. 

The iHeart/TikTok deal is potentially a great thing for radio on the specific condition that it makes iHeart’s broadcast stations available on the TikTok app itself, and that those stations, including iHR’s planned “TikTok Radio,” are encoded for PPM and help increase broadcast radio’s usage. (iHR’s release talks about having TikTok radio on broadcast frequencies, which would presumably make it eligible to encode.)

I’ve long held that whatever the truth about younger listeners’ usage of broadcast radio, TikTok is the thing for which they have the equivalent of our generation’s transistor-radio-under-the-pillow passion. Increasingly, those listeners aren’t grounded enough in radio to have left it by choice; it’s now just one more option among all “streams media.” 

Having iHeart’s channels accessible through the app could give them new currency. It also forces other broadcasters to figure out how they’ll be found. That discussion gets new currency too this week with the sale of TuneIn to Stingray.  

Monday’s announcement says nothing about the timing of the iHR/TikTok deal, but it did prompt Fresh Listens to both existing the iHeart Australia and SXM channels. 

During the latter, I heard the Trending 10 countdown. That show’s new host, Lamar “The Dirty King of Pop,” is somebody I’d like to hear on broadcast radio. Like his predecessor Cat Hailey, he explains how the various songs are being used in TikTok videos. A few times, he seemed as dubious of various memes as any Saturday Night Live skit. To those posting happy-couple videos to Labi Siffre’s “Bless This Telephone,” he remarked, “Y’all are cute, but unfortunately I do have to block you.”  

Here’s SiriusXM’s TikTok Radio at 7 p.m., November 10:

• SZA, “Another Life”
• Diplo f/Trippie Redd, “Wish”
• Onerepublic, “I Ain’t Worried”
• 4 Non Blondes x Nicki Minaj, “Beez in the Trap x What’s Up” (No. 10 on Trending 10)
• Tyler, the Creator, “Sugar on My Tongue” (9)
• Sienna Spiro, “Die on This Hill” (8)
• Tkandz, “Now or Never” (7)
• Labi Siffre, “Bless This Telephone” (6) — 1971 singer-songwriter revival that got a great frontsell from Lamar explaining Siffre’s importance as a worldwide artist without ever sounding like it was read from Wikipedia
• Kid Cudi, “Maui Wowie” (5)
• Sophia James, “So Unfair” (4)
• Taylor Swift, “Opalite” (3)
• Francesca Battistelli, “Free to be Myself” (2) — mid-’00s Christian hit is getting a revival because of user videos about OCD
• Raye, “Where Is My Husband” (1)
• Drinks on Me, “Where Have You Been” — cinematic reworking of the Rihanna hit
• Frank Ocean, “Pink and White”
• Drake, “Nokia (‘Sexyback’ remix)” — the track is the Justin Timberlake hit

Here’s iHeart’s existing TikTok Trending channel on iHeart Australia at 1:30 p.m., November 11:

• Miles Caton, “Somethin” — ballad R&B
• Lily Allen, “P***y Palace”
• Sammy Virji & Skepta, “Cops & Robbers” — UK rap/EDM
• Al Green, “How Can You Mend a Broken Heart” — 1972 cover of the Bee Gees hit that until now lived mostly at Adult R&B radio
• Leo Walt, “Black Beatles” — a dance remake
• Doja Cat, “Paint the Town Red” — with a sweeper about still being hot on TikTok
• Kid Cudi, “Maui Wowie”
• Princess Siena, “PS”
• Glorilla, “TGIF”
• Saweetie, “My Type”
• Ariana Grande, “Break Free”
• Keli Holiday, “Ecstasy” — from the DJ duo Peking Duk; his “Dancing 2” is still a current Australian hit and one of my favorite 2025 songs
• Nosi, “So Good”