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Satellite Radio: XM or Sirius?

Posted by Videos Gone Viral Thursday, December 17, 2009


XM and Sirius are the two major providers of satellite radio. Even though XM had head start of one year, Sirius managed to catch up and obtain half of their audience. Both providers offer very similar programs, so how do you decide which one is the one for you?

XM offers over 136 streams while Sirius offer a little less, 119. XM also provide two premium channels, Playboy and High Voltage, which is a huge advantage over Sirius because Sirius does not offer premium channels at all. The biggest battle between the two occurs over music and news radio stations. This is probably the most important thing to consider when subscribing to either of the two services.

Both XM and Sirius offer basically the same type of music feeds. XM offers 68 and Sirius offer 65. There is a considerable amount of variety on both stations. Let’s look over the genres.

Country

Both services offer country music with subgenres including Alternative Country, Classic Country, Country Hits, and Country Mixes. XM wins this category with 5 streams over 4 for Sirius. If country music is important to you, you should be considering XM over Sirius.

Dance and Latin

Bother services offer Latin and Dance music with subgenres including tropical music and Mexicana. Sirius offers 6 stations while XM offers only 4. Latinos and Latinas should definitely go with Sirius as it offer mores stations as well as better rated streams. Sirius wins without a doubt.

Decades

XM has an advantage over Sirius with music from the 40’s. But, Sirius has 90’s music which XM doesn’t as well as current hits. Both offer music from the 50's, 60's, 70's, and 80's.

Rock

There isn’t much of a comparison in the rock category as Sirius offer 15 streams with XM offering only 14. But you should still consider subgenres. Obviously heavy metal is far from the soft rock which is why subcategories remain a valid aspect of completion between the two. If you look over the statistics, more users prefer Sirius for their harder rock and more XM users subscribe to easy classical rock hits. Mull over this when settle on either of the two.

Other Genres

Bother stations offer several other genres including Classical and Jazz. Sirius does offer Urban and Underground music however which is a great plus. XM offers better Hip-Hop and Mainstream music. If you’re just looking for variety, either XM or Sirius could work for you. There’s always hours upon end of music to listen to.

News Comparisons

If you look at the numbers, Sirius offers 13 streams while XM offers only 11. Both include stations, such as CNN, FOX, Bloomberg, CNBC, and MSNBC. They both offer news in several language, predominantly Spanish. Nonetheless, you should never listen to Fox because it will make your ears bleed.

Analysis

With both services offering more than a few streams and thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of music and news, it is very difficult to choose which one is better. I depends solely on your likes and dislikes. Some people might subscribe to both because they just can choose one. I don’t recommend this however, as most of the streams are identical. You best bet is to flip a coin.

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