Howard Stern Loses Howard 101 After Cutting His Show

SiriusXM dropped Howard Stern’s Howard 101 channel on September 1 and moved Andy Cohen’s Radio Andy into that number. Stern, 72, still has Howard 100. He also has a Monday live show and a new HBO Max cut of the same taping.

In December 2025 he told listeners he had “figured out a way to have it all,” meaning more days off and a seat on the radio. The second channel was the part of that bargain that could be deleted.

Howard 101 Is Off the SiriusXM Lineup

The company posted its new channel numbers starting September 1 on August 28. The note listed sports, comedy, news, talk, and music moves, then named the talk change everyone would clock: Radio Andy slides from channel 102 to channel 101, Howard 100 stays put, and Howard 101 leaves the lineup.

That is the first time since 2005 that Stern has not occupied two adjacent Sirius channels. Howard 100 and Howard 101 went live on September 29, 2005, while he was still finishing his terrestrial contract. His first Sirius show aired January 9, 2006. For 20 years the pair of numbers was the product: live in the morning on 100, and a full second channel of delay, wrap-up, and tape on 101.

The blog did not call the deletion a demotion. It also did not mention staff cuts, the one-day calendar, or HBO Max. It read like a dial map. The map is the tell. Comedy channels were shoved up the list so six big-market sports stations could sit in a block at 94 through 99, directly under Stern. Once that block existed, 101 was the talk slot that no longer had a job.

The Prank From Last September Came Halfway True

Stern and Cohen spent September 2025 pretending the opposite had already happened. Cohen took over Howard 100, called it Andy 100, and talked as if Stern had been pushed out. Stern later came back and said the papers had it wrong. He was in talks. He still loved the company.

On September 1, 2026, they did the bit again, this time on Radio Andy, and this time the smaller version was real. Cohen asked if he was being pranked. Stern said no.

No, you are not being pranked. And Andy has been gracious enough to take over 101. And I have one request: please continue the tradition of doing a lot of gay antics.

Howard Stern, on Radio Andy, September 1, 2026

He told Cohen he was not giving up 100. He also told him not to blow the new number, and that he would be first to laugh if Cohen did. The gag works because last year’s fake firing was about channel 100. This year’s real move is the next button over. Stern still holds the flagship. Cohen now owns the first click after it, which is better real estate than 102 ever was.

Local Sports Stations Took the Block Below 100

The comedy neighborhood used to live at 93 through 99. SiriusXM cleared it to simulcast Audacy and Good Karma sports stations on the satellite. WFAN New York, KSPN Los Angeles, WSCR Chicago, WEEI Boston, WIP Philadelphia, and KRLD Dallas now occupy 94 through 99. More sports stations sit higher on the dial and in the app, including KDKA Pittsburgh and WXYT Detroit.

Comedy did not vanish. It moved. Netflix Is a Joke Radio went from 93 to 105. Kevin Hart’s Laugh Out Loud Radio went from 96 to 103. Sebastian Maniscalco’s Comedy Radio left 99 and landed on Cohen’s old 102. Faction Talk jumped from 103 to 137. SiriusXM FC and VSiN were sent to 188 and 189.

THE SEPTEMBER 1 DIAL CHANGES

A one-day Stern show does not need two channels sitting on top of a new sports block. A weekday Cohen show can use the leftover number. That is the corporate math, and it is colder than a feud. Stern’s reduced output made 101 the cheapest talk channel to erase.

What a One-Show Week Does to a Second Channel

Stern signed the three-year extension on December 16, 2025, on his last show of that year. It is the shortest Sirius deal of his run. Earlier renewals were five years. His last completed pact was estimated at $100 million a year. The new terms were not disclosed. He said the draw was a more flexible calendar for himself and co-host Robin Quivers, and that he would not have stayed if she was not up for it.

He also said he liked his days off. The company had already been chasing $200 million in annualized savings in 2025. A lighter Stern week fit both wishes. The live show falls from two new days to one live show a week, on Mondays, when he returns September 14. Four days of the channel will run on old tape. A second 24-hour channel cannot live on that diet.

Staff found out the hard way. On February 12, 2026, an off-air round of cuts hit people who were not on the microphone. On July 13, a Zoom call sent home about a dozen more, including on-air names Memet Walker, Benjy Bronk, Jonathan Blitt, Mike Trainor, and Rahsaan Rogers. They were told to leave that day. Severance tracked time on the job and came with a nondisclosure deal. Trainor wrote that his run had ended after 12 years, called it an eternity, and thanked Stern for the ride.

THE YEAR HOWARD 101 RAN OUT OF ROAD

1. September 15, 2025: Andy Cohen signs a three-year Radio Andy extension, with Andy Cohen Live still weekdays at 10 a.m. ET.
2. December 16, 2025: Stern tells listeners he is back for three years with more free time, through 2028.
3. February 12, 2026: Off-air staff are cut in the first 2026 round.
4. July 13, 2026: A Zoom call lays off about a dozen people and confirms the one-show week.
5. August 28, 2026: SiriusXM posts the lineup note that Howard 101 is leaving.
6. August 31, 2026: Stern and SiriusXM announce the HBO Max window.
7. September 1, 2026: Radio Andy occupies 101. Howard 101 is gone.
8. September 14, 2026: The new season starts on Howard 100, Mondays only.

An insider line from the summer put the programming logic in one sentence: he just does not need that much content anymore. The people who built the extra content were the ones who left first.

Wrap-Up Wednesday and the App Vault

Howard 101 was never only a rerun dump, and that is why longtime listeners treat the deletion as a library fire even if the tapes still exist. In the early Sirius years it carried a West Coast delay of the live show, afternoon host Bubba the Love Sponge, and sports talker Scott Ferrall. Later it became the house for classic interviews, clip shows, and the Wrap-Up Show.

WHAT HOWARD 101 USED TO CARRY

• The delay: A tape-delayed Howard Stern Show for the West Coast clock, so 101 was live-ish when 100 had moved on.
• The Wrap-Up Show: Gary Dell’Abate and Jon Hein extending the morning, now slated as Wrap Up Wednesday on Howard 100.
• The vault: Sternthology-style repeats, old interviews, and concert specials that ran all day without a new taping.
• The farm team: Early hires such as Bubba the Love Sponge and Scott Ferrall, before 101 narrowed into archive duty.

SiriusXM is not throwing the catalog in the trash. On September 14, Howard 100 gets a new grid, including that expanded Wrap Up Wednesday. The SiriusXM app is adding Howard Stern Decades, with bins for the 80s, 90s, 00s, and 10s. Scott Greenstein, SiriusXM’s president and chief content officer, said the company is keeping Stern through 2028 for the exclusive live show and a deep library of classic Howard. The library survives as folders and as filler on 100. It no longer has a channel that plays it as a place.

That is the part of the old show some listeners still want. The current live product is celebrity sit-downs, the kind of hour Stern now sells as craft. The older, messier staff show lived on 101 between those interviews. Folding the vault into an app tab is tidy. It is also how a 20-year brand becomes one Monday and a search bar.

Mondays on the Radio, Thursdays on HBO Max

Two days after the lineup note, Stern and SiriusXM announced the other half of the new week. New shows air every Monday on SiriusXM starting September 14. An adapted version lands on HBO Max on Thursdays starting September 17, at 3:01 a.m. ET, with periodic extras. The companies described live Mondays and HBO Max Thursdays as a first: the SiriusXM show, cut for streaming, going worldwide through Max. Older live episodes are not part of the deal. Only the new season moves.

The Monday lock is not a vibe. Video needs a fixed taping day so editors can turn a three-hour radio show into a Thursday episode. Stern is not adding work. He is pointing cameras at the one day he is already doing. Greenstein called it another chapter in a long run and tied it to the 2028 radio deal. Stern treated it as the “King of All Media” label finally covering a prestige streamer.

As the King of All Media, I am honored to bring my SiriusXM show to HBO Max, and through HBO Max to worldwide distribution. For years, my SiriusXM show has offered only brief video peeks. HBO convinced me to pull back the curtain and let the world watch; the amazing celebrities and musicians who drop by, our staff antics, and my conversations with Robin.

Howard Stern, statement with the August 31, 2026 announcement

Staff antics are harder to stage after the July Zoom. The remaining producers are the ones he kept because the week is smaller. Beth Stern, 53, had already told Cohen, on Cohen’s own show, that she pushes Howard to stay on the air, that he still enjoys it, and that the job keeps him connected. She got the outcome she wanted. The version that survived is one Monday, a Thursday stream, and no 101.

Radio Andy Already Had a Three-Year Extension

Cohen, 58, is not a last-minute replacement host. SiriusXM announced his own three-year Radio Andy extension on September 15, 2025, during the channel’s 10-year mark. Andy Cohen Live stays weekdays at 10 a.m. ET with co-host John Hill. The channel still runs a bench of Bravo-adjacent voices. Cohen called SiriusXM a home that let him build a pop-culture destination. Greenstein called the channel a live, unfiltered stop for that audience.

So the September 1 move is a promotion on his side of the hallway. He already had a daily show and a fresh contract through the same 2028 window as Stern. He now has the number next to Howard 100. Maniscalco inherits 102. Stern inherits a cleaner week, a TV cut, and the job of filling five extra days with tape that used to have its own home.

The live Stern show that returns September 14 will sound like the show he has been building for years, famous guests and long interviews, then Dell’Abate and Hein on Wednesday. The tapes still play. They play on 100, and they play when someone opens Decades in the app. They do not play as a channel you can leave on all afternoon, which is the thing Howard 101 actually was.