Free SiriusXM for the Next 2 Weeks - June 25 to July 6

Got some junk mail today.  Thought I'd share.

SiriusXM is having a money drive...so over 100 channels free for the next 2 weeks to try and get subscribers.

I wouldnt use it if it was free forever.  They finally quit calling me after i told them that. It was an amazing product when it was new, but it hasnt been relevant pandora, spotify, amazon music, etc. 

In reply to TJL (Forum Supporter) :

Sorry you are bitter over your past relationship...I'm not trying to get anybody to send them money.  I won't.  Just thought I'd share that this is available for free for a couple of weeks if anybody wants to listen.  I happen to have 3 vehicles with old @ss factory radios that have no bluetooth, no 3.5mm aux inputs, no usb inputs, 2 of 3 have non-working cd players and the other one has a cassette deck.  2 of them do however have SiriusXM tuners built-in, so I can listen to some different crappy stations for a couple of weeks for free. 

In reply to secretariata (Forum Supporter) :

My comment came out sounding crappy, it wasn't meant to be.  I was a huge XM fan, but when they got into the awful deal with sirius and added dj's and there was a few other things they changed i didnt like. I started listening to pandora at that point. 

Pandora is only useful if 1) your vehicle has a way to deal with playing music from your phone and 2) you have cell service :) I use Sirius in the 2010 bluetoothless truck when I'm running cross-country, we have a lot of no-service area here.

I use Live X Live, formerly Slacker, unless you're skipping a lot of songs, you'll rarely run into no service issues, it buffers 3 or 4 songs before they're played, so short of driving across Death Valley, it's pretty good.

We got a lot of use out of 1 year free in our work truck, but admin didn't seem to want to pay for it after the year was up, weird.

I think every new VW we've bought in the past 10 years came with 3-6 months free, originally just XM before the merge.  When our first 6 months of free was up, we were all set to buy the ~$300 life time service they were offering.  Then we found out it wasn't our life time, it was the vehicle's life time, service was tied to the receiver in our car... uh, no thanks.  I think they called and mailed us for at least 3 years trying to get us back.

In reply to secretariata (Forum Supporter) :

Thank for the tip.  My new-to-me Grand Caravan that is XM capable will be nice to have the tunes for a while.  

I still like it for road trips, but I don't pay anywhere near full price for it. I just renewed it in the Expedition for $80 for the year.  Aside from the cell service issue, there's also something to be said for the convenience of having it right in the car's infotainment system and not needing a phone. Plus, my phone is usually running Waze.

The trick is to cancel. You have to call to do that. They'll offer you a $5/month deal for 6 months to come back - maybe not immediately, but eventually. Then you make a reminder to yourself to call and cancel in 6 months. Did it for years.

The annual renewal process sucks. You have to call and tell them you are canceling and then keep doing that until they offer you the service at a reasonable price. I hate it.

Unfortunately up until the pandemic I spent most of my day in the car. Music doesn't cut it as my interests aren't that broad. I enjoy at least half the day listening to talk radio and SiriusXM has two commentators I really, really enjoy. So, every year I do the dance with customer service.

Since I've been mostly working at home I don't get to listen to it because the streaming service is optional/additional and I've also never been able to get it to work.

It's a case of "love the product, hate the company" for me.

Yep. I love the service, since my phone doesn't work where there's no AT&T signal but XM does. I have tuners in every car, but call and cancel every six months to pay $5/month. My last renewal was due right when the pandemic started, so I actually canceled in order to save some money during stay at home. Now I'm missing it again and need to call them. 

Its supposed to be free today but wasn't working on my car. Still saying I had to subscribe and not letting me listen to any of the channels

TJL (Forum Supporter) said:

In reply to secretariata (Forum Supporter) :

 I was a huge XM fan, but when they got into the awful deal with sirius and added dj's ......

THIS RIGHT HERE.  I had XM in the beginning, when they had that module thing that plugged in to the boombox that looked like a bowtie, and car cradles in 3 cars.  I loved it, great for traveling, no commercials on local radio.  Dropped it when $ got tight before the eventual divorce.

Tried it again later after the merger and the DJ's just won't berkeleying shut up.  I also got tired of the threaten to cancel game every few months.  Using Google Play Music through SWMBO's family plan basically for free on my end and couldn't be happier.

Spotify premium = the ability to create and download playlists to your phone to listen to in the event you lose cell service.

z31maniac said:

Spotify premium = the ability to create and download playlists to your phone to listen to in the event you lose cell service.

You can also do this with podcasts (for free) and audiobooks.  Super easy to fill up on enough content to entertain you for days at a time.

i just got it for $60 for the year, not bad.  I listen to it at the gym and in the car so it's worth it for that.

docwyte said:

Its supposed to be free today but wasn't working on my car. Still saying I had to subscribe and not letting me listen to any of the channels

Based on your comment, I went out to my Dodge and sure enough, it is working now for me. 

The channel, Lithium was belting out Luscious Jackson's "Naked Eyes."  

Sometimes the  receiver has to be turned on for a while before it registers a status update. Give it a few minutes if you're not getting the free access.

I actually listen to audiobooks more than XM these days on road trips, but sometimes you just want to let the radio take care of itself. I also used to listen to the BBC and CBC while driving. It's a good option for my use case - which does actually include driving across Death Valley once in a while :) If you live out east, you may not realize how empty the west is sometimes, so terrestrial radio and cell service just isn't much of an option.

In reply to docwyte :

It could also be the specific channel. The mailer implied that not all channels were included. Said something like "over 100 channels" , so I'm not sure if it excludes more than the premium channels.

I'm working from home this week, so probably won't actually try it before Saturday.

I'll try it after work today.  Could be it didn't update since the car was in the garage all night.

In reply to docwyte :

It didn't work for me today in our VW either, after a ~5 minute drive. Tried it in the Dodge parked in the driveway and it wasn't working either after a couple minutes of playing with the tuner.

Still not working in my car, even with it sitting outside the entire day

I think the receiver actually has to be powered up and listening to the satellites when the activation signal is sent. I'll check the Dodge this weekend.

Keith Tanner said:

I think the receiver actually has to be powered up and listening to the satellites when the activation signal is sent. I'll check the Dodge this weekend.

What does this mean exactly? We're about to set out on a 4 hour road trip. The AngieVan has Sirius as a "band". Will I be able to just start the car, and tune in to The Loft or Outlaw?

Basically, yes. You may get the "please sign up for Sirius!" ad for a few minutes, then the display will say something like "updating..." and it should come back with full access. I don't know the tech exactly, but from watching mine over the years it's become clear that the receiver gets lock/unlock permission via a signal from the satellite, and those signals get sent several times as the bandwidth presents itself.