Perhaps no one can give a clear answer to this question. Firstly, as mentioned above, formats are born and die out. Secondly, the number and variety of formats depends on the territory. Thirdly, many formats have subformats – that is, for example, a station playing rock music can offer domestic rock, and maybe – western rock, maybe – modern rock, and maybe – classical. In general, it is believed that today there are more than 100 formats. Among them there are formats widely popular, designed for a mass audience, and the so-called “niche formats”, designed for a narrow segment of listeners.
An example of a format designed for a wide listening audience is the Top 40, which we have already mentioned above. Over half a century this format has transformed into something broader than just broadcasting forty “top” songs. Now it is called CHR (Contemporary Hit Radio), i.e. Contemporary Hit Radio. However, since different styles of music have different hits, this format has several subformats – Rhythmic CHR, Dance CHR, Pop CHR, Rock CHR, National CHR, etc. Today this group of formats is mainly oriented to young people. Therefore, music dominates the airwaves, news and programs occupy minimum time and are of secondary importance.
Another mass format is AC (Adult Contemporary) – modern music for adults. The stations of this format air well-known pop songs without aggressive styles. The audience of this format is wider than that of CHR – AC is aimed at listeners aged 25 to 45. In the air of stations working in AC format, music also prevails over information: the information component is wider and deeper in the morning prime, while in the afternoon and evening it is minimized. This format also has several subformats. For example, Soft AC is aimed mainly at women and offers soft lyrical music. And Hot AC is a kind of hybrid between AC and CHR.
Among the formats aimed at mass audiences in the U.S. are also formats that offer the listener music from the past years of different ages – Oldies, Nostalgia, Golden Hits, Classic Hits, etc. Nostalgia presents big band music popular in the 30s-50s of the last century, Oldies – hits of the 50s-60s. Golden Hits and Classic Hits – more recent music from the 70s, 80s and 90s. In our country, unlike in the U.S., for obvious reasons, commercially attractive are these last formats from the group of “retro”.
Another popular format in Western countries is the news format (All News) or the information-talk format (News Talk). At the time of its birth and in the period of formation, this format was initially perceived very skeptically. Many American analysts doubted that there would be enough journalists in the country to prepare and broadcast non-stop news around the clock, as well as the right number of listeners willing to listen to the news. However, in spite of everything, the stations of news and information-talk format today are almost the most demanded in the United States. Among other talk formats we can also mention the Sport and Financial formats, addressed to sports fans and business people, respectively. By the way, the appearance of the financial format was also met with some skepticism at one time – many experts believed that these stations are doomed to failure, because economic information is impossible to present without charts and graphs.
Another very popular American format is Country, representing American music of the same name. The format is also divided into many subformats, depending on whether only hit songs, classics of the genre, or everything from the world of country music is aired. For obvious reasons, this format is unlikely to be popular anywhere outside the United States.
Speaking of rock stations, which are also quite popular in the US. In the birthplace of rock ‘n’ roll today there are a great number of formats and sub-formats that promote various styles and trends of rock to the masses. Among such formats are Mainstream Rock, Classic Rock, Heart of the Rock, Alternative Rock, Soft Rock, AOR (Album oriented rock). The last format we mentioned is sometimes deciphered as Adult Oriented Rock or Adult Oriented Radio; the airwaves of such stations are dominated not by hit singles, but by less hackneyed songs from albums of rock bands and artists.