March – Isle of Wight Radio switches from AM to FM broadcasting. In addition to its main transmitter at Chillerton Down, the station uses three relay transmitters to cover the full island.
4 April – BBC Radio 3's weekday breakfast programme On Air begins broadcasting at the weekend.[4]
6 April – Extensive schedule changes are made to BBC Radio 4. These include an earlier start to the day – 5:30am instead of 6am – and an earlier, 6am, start to Today. Many long standing programmes are axed as part of the shake-up[5] and arts magazine Kaleidoscope is replaced by Front Row.
12 April – A Sunday evening episode of The Archers is introduced.
13 April – After nearly 30 years on air, Dance Band Days is broadcast on BBC Radio 2 for the final time.
April – After just seven months on air, East Midlands station Radio 106 is rebranded as Century 106 and relaunched with a new team of presenters.[6]
9 July – The BBC unveils a new range of digitalcar stereos that will go on sale in August.[7]
August
August – Virgin Radio launches a new Saturday afternoon football show called Rock 'n' Roll Football.[8]
September
September – Kevin Greening leaves the BBC Radio 1 breakfast show, leaving Zoë Ball as sole presenter. She continues to host the show until March 2000.
October
2 October – John Dunn presents his final drivetime show on Radio 2 after 22 years.[9]
4 October – On Radio 2, David Jacobs presents Frank Sinatra: The Voice of the Century, a 13-part documentary about the life and career of Frank Sinatra.[10] The series concludes on 27 December.[11]
5 October
A major overhaul of the BBC Radio 2 schedule sees many new faces joining the network, including the singer Katrina Leskanich and former Radio 1 presenter Lynn Parsons, who present overnight shows on weekdays and weekends respectively. Johnnie Walker also joins Radio 2 as a regular presenter hosting the afternoon drivetime show (Monday to Thursday). Sally Boazman becomes the station's first official traffic presenter.
One hour of Virgin Radio's breakfast show starts simulcasting on Sky One. When a track is played on the radio, viewers see the song's video.[12]
9 October – Des Lynam joins Radio 2 to present a weekly drivetime programme on Fridays.[13]
12 October – Chris Moyles is promoted from the Early Breakfast show to present the Radio 1 Early Drive show, between 4pm and 5:45pm on weekdays (later being extended to 3–5:45pm). He replaces Dave Pearce, and is replaced on Early Breakfast by Scott Mills.
15 October – Launch of In Our Time, a weekly series of historical, scientific, literary or philosophical discussions between Melvyn Bragg and three academics on BBC Radio 4. It will pass its 1000th edition in 2023.[14]
November
12 November – TalkCo Holdings, whose chairman and chief executive is former Sun editor Kelvin MacKenzie, purchases Talk Radio.[15]
BBC Local Radio stations start carrying BBC Radio 5 Live instead of the BBC World Service when they are not on air. Consequently, the station is heard regularly on FM for the first time, albeit only during overnight hours.
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