KMUW

KMUW 89.1 FM is Wichita's NPR station, a noncommercial public radio station licensed to Wichita State University and run as an outreach service of the university. It broadcasts from studios at WSU Old Town, 121 N. Mead in downtown Wichita, Kansas, and its 100,000-watt signal from a transmitter in Colwich covers an area where about 710,000 people live. Listeners also reach it through the KMUW app, its live stream and its podcasts.

KMUW went on the air on April 26, 1949, as the first 10-watt noncommercial FM station in the United States and the first noncommercial FM station in Kansas. It became a charter member of NPR in 1971, raised its power to 100,000 watts in 1987 and moved into its Old Town studios in 2016. Member donations provide about two thirds of its funding, with the rest from Wichita State, business sponsors and grants.

The station carries NPR and other national and international programming alongside its own news and music. Its reporters file stories nationally to NPR, regionally to Harvest Public Media and statewide through the Kansas News Service; the newsroom also produces the Spanish-language podcast Radio Real and was a founding partner of the Wichita Journalism Collaborative. The Kansas Association of Broadcasters named KMUW its Large Market Station of the Year in 2025 for the 12th year in a row. KMUW also hosts community events such as Fill Your Mug, Literary Feast, Wichitalks and Pint Night.

KMUW hires through Wichita State University, and its openings appear on the university's jobs site. Its staff covers news reporting and editing, arts reporting, digital content and social media, marketing, community engagement and partnerships, corporate sponsorship sales and engineering. The station trains students through paid News Lab internships with WSU's Elliott School of Communication and the summer Korva Coleman Journalism Internship, supported by the Kansas Pro Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.