Radio stations from Jalisco

Jalisco is one of Mexico's most radio-rich states, and if you grew up there or your family did, the dial probably sounds like home. Our catalog currently carries 54 live stations from Jalisco, most of them broadcasting from Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta, with smaller voices from towns like Ciudad Guzmán, San Juan de los Lagos, Ameca, and Arandas.

This guide walks through the real history of radio in the state, told through its stations, then covers what to listen to today, the genres that dominate the dial, and — most importantly for readers in the United States — how and when to tune in, with the time difference worked out for you.

A Story Told Through Its Stations

The best way to understand radio in Jalisco is to look at individual frequencies and how they changed hands, formats, and cities over decades. The stories below all come from our station records, and together they trace the same arc the whole country followed: AM giving way to FM, family concessions giving way to radio groups, and new frequencies finally reaching towns that had never had a local station.

The postwar beginnings: XEBC in Ciudad Guzmán

One of the oldest stories in our catalog begins in Ciudad Guzmán, in the southern part of the state. The callsign XEBC reappeared on air in December 1948, when Radio Ciudad Guzmán, S.A., won the concession for XEBC-AM 990, serving the town with 1,000 watts by day and just 100 at night — typical for the era, when many AM stations had to power down after sunset.

In 1972 the concession passed to Radio Armonía, which received a complementary FM station in 1994. Today that FM signal lives on as Amor es 95.1, and in March 2019 the group handed the old AM frequency back to the regulator, citing high operating costs. The AM era, in other words, ended in Ciudad Guzmán just a few years ago — something worth remembering the next time an older relative insists radio "used to be different."

The 1950s and 1960s: local AM arrives in the towns

Guadalajara's AM dial was growing at the same time. XEKB-AM received its concession in May 1959, broadcasting from Atemajac on 1590 kHz under Promotriz Radiofónica, S.A. It later moved to 1410 kHz and eventually raised its power to 25,000 daytime watts — a serious signal for the era, one that reached far beyond the city.

That frequency's long journey — sold to Grupo Radiodigital Siglo XXI, absorbed by Grupo Radio México and later Grupo Radio Centro in 2008, and finally migrated to FM in 2019 — ended with it becoming La Lupe 99.9 FM, owned by Multimedios Radio. The switch to FM in 2019 closed the book on "Canal 1410" after more than 40 years on AM. If your grandparents remember a station on 1410, this is the one.

The 1960s brought radio to Jalisco's smaller cities too. In Ciudad Guzmán, XEIS-AM 670 received its concession in December 1963 and went on the air in June 1965 as a 1 kW daytime station. By the late 1960s it had been sold to Radio Sistema del Pacífico. It was authorized to migrate to FM in 2011, and in 2018 its transmitter moved to Cerro La Escalera. Today it is La Rancherita 106.3 FM, which also transmits on 88.9 FM in Tamazula de Gordiano — a frequency obtained in the 2017 IFT-4 station auction. In 2016, full ownership passed to Rodrigo Rodríguez Reyes and Josefina Reyes Sahagún, marking the definitive acquisition of the station by Grupo Radiofónico ZER.

The FM boom of the late 1970s and 1980s

The late 1970s and 1980s were when FM really arrived in Jalisco, and four concessions from that period still define the dial:

• 1978: Match 89.5 FM in Puerto Vallarta received its concession, originally owned by Manuel Ayala Estrada. By the 1990s it belonged to Grupo ACIR, and for years it was a Radio Disney affiliate. When Disney and ACIR ended their partnership in December 2019 — a split that covered twelve Mexican cities — ten of those twelve stations, including this one, flipped to ACIR's pop format, Match, which is what it still carries today.
• 1979: Guadalajara's 107.5 FM received its first concession on October 2, originally under Radiodifusoras y Televisoras del Noreste and operated by Promomedios. That frequency, now Vibe 107.5, has been through a remarkable string of identities: Grupo Audiorama took control in November 2021 and after two days of looping songs flipped it to electronic music as Vibe FM. That format ended in July 2024, the station relaunched as a classics-focused "Retro," and it has since adopted the alternative "RMX" format — even replaying the last programs aired on a Mexico City station that once carried RMX. One frequency, five identities in a decade.
• 1982: AMOR 93.1 (XHPI-FM) received its concession on November 10. The original concession holder was Francisco Ibarra López, founder of Grupo ACIR, and the station still carries ACIR's romantic Amor format today — one of the most stable identities on the dial.
• 1986: In Puerto Vallarta, XEVAY received its concession in December 1986 under Nenette Semenow Canan, becoming an AM-FM combination in 1994. The FM side is now Mix 92.7, an English-language adult contemporary station — proof that the beach towns have always had a bilingual, tourist-facing side to their dials.

The 1990s: growth on the coast

Puerto Vallarta's radio market kept expanding. La Poderosa 94.3 FM began as XEPVJ, which received its first concession in February 1993 and added its FM signal a year later. Owned by Radiorama and transmitting from Bahía de Banderas on the Nayarit side of the bay, it carries a grupera format — a reminder that regional Mexican music is as strong on the beach as it is in the highlands.

The 2010s and 2020s: new auctions, new owners

The most recent chapter of Jalisco radio is written by government spectrum auctions and corporate consolidation.

The IFT-4 auction of 2017 reshaped the map. In San Juan de los Lagos, the winning bidder for 96.1 FM paid 12.5 million pesos but was disqualified nationally, and Grupo Radiofónico Zer — which had registered precisely to catch frequencies like this — picked it up for 3.1 million pesos. The station went on air in April 2019 as San Juan FM 96.1, only the second commercial station in that deeply religious pilgrimage town.

In Puerto Vallarta, the same auction awarded 98.3 FM at 45.7 million pesos, making it the third most expensive station in the entire auction, behind only two frequencies in Guadalajara's rival markets — one won by Televisa Radio for 52.4 million and one in Cancún won by Grupo Radio Centro for 86.5 million. It became Radiante 98.3 FM, owned by CPS Media, part of Grupo Editorial Tribuna — a newspaper group that had been trying to get into radio since 1995, when it asked the federal government to open new commercial stations, only to see none awarded.

Zer also expanded through non-commercial permits: Arandas FM 107.3 in the Los Altos region received its permit in April 2013 and operates as one of two permitted stations run through the association Impulsa por el Bien Común de Jalisco.

And in Guadalajara, 2022–2023 brought the end of the "Planeta" format on 99.9 FM and its replacement, two days later, by La Lupe — with Multimedios Radio formally receiving the concession in May 2023.

The pattern across all these stories: AM gave way to FM, family concessions gave way to groups like ACIR, Radiorama, Multimedios, and Zer, and auctioned frequencies finally brought local radio to towns that never had it.

The Stations to Know Today

Based on listening in our catalog, these are some of the most popular Jalisco stations right now:

• Radiorama 1340 Frecuencia Deportiva — sports talk from Guadalajara. Ideal for Chivas fans abroad who want analysis, not just score updates.
• La Mejor Guadalajara and La Ke Buena Guadalajara — two of the biggest names in banda and regional Mexican music, and a genuine rivalry worth sampling both sides of.
• Fórmula Melódica — classic romantic Spanish-language hits.
• Radio Metrópoli 1150 AM — one of the remaining AM voices in Guadalajara, and a link to an older broadcasting style.
• Radio Universidad de Guadalajara — public, cultural programming from the state university, broadcasting to Puerto Vallarta.
• FM Globo Guadalajara — romantic and melodic programming for slow evenings.
• W Radio Guadalajara — national news and talk with local presence.
• Exa FM Guadalajara and LOS40 Guadalajara — youth pop, both Mexican and international.
• Señal 90 and LA OCTAVA — for listeners looking past the big networks.
• La Líder in Ameca — proof that Jalisco's radio heart beats far beyond the two big cities.

A note on duplicates: national formats like La Ke Buena, W Radio, and Mix appear in both Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta versions, and they are not always identical. Local inserts, commercials, and show times differ, so if you're listening for a specific host or a specific city's traffic and weather, make sure you've picked the right city's stream — Mix 92.7 Vallarta is not the same feed as a Guadalajara pop station, and W Radio Vallarta carries its own local windows.

What You'll Hear: Genres on the Jalisco Dial

Jalisco is the cradle of mariachi and ranchera music, so it's no surprise that regional Mexican sounds lead the lineup, but the dial is genuinely varied. Here is the full genre breakdown for the state from our catalog:

• Pop Latino and hits — 18 stations, the largest single group
• Regional Mexicano — 14 stations
• Banda — 12 stations, including La Mejor and La Ke Buena
• Clásicos and retro — 11 stations for golden-era favorites
• News and talk — 10 stations
• Románticas and ballads — 9 stations, including both Amor signals
• Rock en Español — 5 stations
• Electrónica — 5 stations

A practical way to use these numbers: the genre pages double as a search tool. If you only remember that your tía always had "the romantic one" on, open the románticas page and you'll see Amor Guadalajara, AMOR 93.1, and FM Globo side by side. If what you miss is the sound of a Sunday family gathering, go banda or regional. If you want what your parents' car radio played, try clásicos. And if you want to argue about football, go straight to the sports stations.

How to Listen from the US

Every station in our Jalisco section streams live online, which means distance doesn't matter anymore — only the clock does. Here's the practical part.

The time difference, worked out

Most of Jalisco, including Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta, stays on standard time year-round, while most of the US shifts with daylight saving. In practice:

• From US Central Time: the same hour most of the year; your city is one hour ahead of Guadalajara during US daylight saving.
• From US Eastern: one hour ahead of Guadalajara most of the year, two hours ahead during daylight saving.
• From US Pacific: the same hour during daylight saving; Guadalajara is one hour ahead otherwise.

What that means for real listening: a morning show airing at 7:00 AM in Guadalajara reaches you at 8:00 or 9:00 AM on the East Coast — still in time for your commute. Evening drive-time in Guadalajara (roughly 5–7 PM) lands in the late afternoon or early evening across the US, which works well for second-generation listeners tuning in after work. Midday programs, on the other hand, can fall during the US morning, which is actually convenient for música during chores or a workout.

Finding your station

Browse the full Guadalajara listing for the big-city dial — it's the second largest city page in our Mexico catalog after the capital — or start from all of Mexico and narrow by state. If you only remember the station name and not the city, use the genre pages above: La Mejor fans, for instance, can jump between La Mejor Guadalajara and La Mejor Puerto Vallarta, or compare with La Ke Buena Puerto Vallarta for the same style.

Listening for family occasions

Live radio from home shines on specific days. For families from San Juan de los Lagos, having San Juan FM playing during the town's pilgrimage season connects you to what's actually happening there, in real time. For Guadalajara natives, sports radio like Radiorama 1340 turns a Chivas match into a shared living-room experience even from a thousand miles away. And regional Mexican stations are the safest bet for background music during a family birthday call — you'll hear what your relatives hear.

Beyond Jalisco: Nearby Regions to Explore

Radio culture in western and northern Mexico overlaps a lot with Jalisco's, so if you run out of new stations, try these neighboring catalog sections:

• Sinaloa — 67 stations, and the home of banda music itself
• Chihuahua — 54 stations, the same count as Jalisco
• Monterrey, Nuevo León — 52 stations in one of Mexico's biggest metros
• Nuevo León — 41 stations statewide
• Sonora — 41 stations
• Veracruz — 44 stations with a very different musical identity
• Ciudad de México — 350 stations, the biggest dial in the country, where many of Jalisco's formats originated

A Quick Listening Plan

If you're new to Jalisco radio, here's a simple way in, arranged around a US workday:

1. Morning: news and talk on W Radio Guadalajara or Radio fórmula to know what Jalisco is talking about today.
2. Midday: banda and regional on La Mejor — the sound of the tianguis and the lunch table.
3. Afternoon: pop on Exa FM or LOS40, or something more left-field like Radio Cañón or Canal 58.
4. Evening: baladas on Amor Guadalajara or FM Globo.
5. Game day: Radiorama 1340 for fútbol coverage, with Radio Vital as a talk alternative.

From a 1,000-watt AM station in Ciudad Guzmán in 1948 to auctioned FM frequencies in San Juan de los Lagos in 2019, radio in Jalisco has always been local first. Frequencies changed hands, formats came and went, and AM slowly faded — but the voices stayed close to home. That's exactly what makes this dial worth listening to from anywhere, and now, with 54 live streams at your fingertips, you can.