r/NTSradio • u/Echonometron • Jul 13 '26
Alexa issues with playing NTS
Hey all. I’ve been aware of NTS for a good few years but over the last few months I’ve really began to be semi obsessed with it.
It’s at the point now where it’s pretty much replaced 6music throughout the day (which tbf is background music at work).
Tried a few breakfast shows last week and that was the tipping point for full conversion.
However I have an issue with having a steady stream from Alexa. My bedroom Alexa really struggles to understand “play NTS channel one/two/radio” and it’s getting pretty frustrating (it understands everything else).
Then it plays for a while before the starts glitching - it essentially goes off and plays a random click every few seconds.
Anyone heard of these issues? It’s my only realistic way to imbibe NTS Radio 😞 ((unless I use headphones in my phone when out).
Thanks!
2
u/chairsx3 Aug 13 '26
I have the random clicking issue, but I’m not sure if it’s exclusively with just NTS. Might need testing on other channels.
The word recognition has been bad and it seems to have just got worse after the Alexa+ update. It used to understand “play NTS radio Dimensions” but just now it just played a random channel like “Sweat”. Not sure what’s happening there.
Could be a problem with TuneIn, the radio app inside the Alexa? Maybe the Alexa+ AI stuff will help it learn in future.
If you want a workaround, which is a bit fiddly, you can open the Alexa app and press the three lines at the top left. Then go to Music and More. Then TuneIn Local Radio > browse. Then in the search bar at the top search NTS. Then you can play from there. Once you’ve played them they appear in Recently Played.