All these years, many smartphones sold in the US had their FM chip disabled intentionally by the carriers and OEMs for commercial reasons. It was seen as a move by the carriers to push users to consume more data and thereby pay more every month.
Thankfully, things started changing in the last year or so when LG, Motorola, Alcatel, and other companies decided to activate the FM chips on their smartphones going forward. Earlier this year, Samsung also joined the party by deciding to activate the FM chips on its upcoming smartphones in the US and Canada.
Samsung forgot to add the NAB FM API
While Samsung kept its promise for the carrier variants of the recently launched Galaxy S9 and Galaxy S9+ sold in the US, it appears the unlocked Galaxy S9 and S9+ models don't have their FM chips activated yet. NextRadio, the company that Samsung partnered with to enable the FM chips on its smartphones, lists only the carrier variants of the Galaxy S9 and S9+ as supported models.
When Android Police reached out to NextRadio to figure out what's happening, they received the following response from the company:
“Samsung mistakenly did not add the NAB FM API to the unlocked devices. Our team confirmed this with them a couple of days after release upon receiving reports the app did not work. Samsung has said it will be in the first update they do, but have not yet settled on a date.
The model numbers are SM-G960UI and SM-G965UI that do not currently work for FM. SM-G960U and SM-G965U are sold through carriers and do work for FM.”
Many people buy unlocked Galaxy smartphones in the US to avoid all the anti-customer decisions associated with the carrier variants. So, it must be disappointing for the unlocked Galaxy S9 and S9+ users in the US to miss out on a nifty little feature. Hopefully, Samsung pushes the promised update soon and fix this.
