Short answer: every On Air audio plan runs Icecast KH. If you are coming from a Shoutcast station, the move is straightforward and your listeners will not need to do anything.
What your station runs
All of our Audiocast plans are built on Icecast KH, a maintained version of the Icecast streaming server. You do not choose a server type when you order, and you do not need to configure one — your station is provisioned ready to broadcast.
Why Icecast
It is open source, and stays that way. The code is public and reviewed continuously, which means security problems get found and fixed quickly rather than privately.
Secure administration. Icecast supports HTTPS for administrative access, so your station credentials are never sent in the clear. This is a practical difference, not a theoretical one.
Guest broadcasters without complications. Icecast supports our DJ Accounts feature directly — you can give a guest presenter their own username, password and connection point, without sharing your main login and without any additional service running. Some other platforms require an automation system to be switched on before guest accounts work at all.
More formats, not fewer. Icecast handles a wider range of audio formats, including lossless FLAC, alongside the MP3 and AAC you are most likely using.
It can pull from anywhere. If you relay another station's feed, Icecast can take that feed from either an Icecast or a Shoutcast source. The reverse is not true.
"But my station was set up for Shoutcast"
This comes up often, and the answer is reassuring: almost nothing has to change.
Your listeners do not need to do anything
Icecast serves audio to ordinary players, apps, browsers and smart speakers exactly as Shoutcast does. Your audience will not be able to tell which server you are on. You will give them a new stream address, and that is the extent of it.
Your broadcasting software almost certainly already works
Every application commonly used for live audio broadcasting supports Icecast, usually alongside other options in the same connection dialog — BUTT, Mixxx, RadioBOSS, SAM Cast, RadioCaster, VirtualDJ PRO, PlayIt Live and iziCast on iOS among them. In most cases the change is selecting "Icecast" in a dropdown and entering the new connection details we provide.
Your audio files need no conversion
This is the part people expect to be difficult, and it is not. An MP3 is an MP3. Your existing library, jingles, promos and recorded programmes transfer as they are. Icecast supports a wider range of formats, so nothing in your archive becomes unusable. If you do happen to hold audio in an unusual format, it converts in minutes with free software — and we will help.
What you will rebuild
Your playlists and scheduled automation are rebuilt in your On Air control panel, because that information lives in the control panel rather than in the audio files. For most stations this is an afternoon's work, and the result is usually tidier than what it replaced.
Moving across, step by step
- Order your Audiocast plan. Your station is provisioned automatically.
- Upload your existing audio to the media library — no conversion needed.
- Rebuild your playlists and schedule in the control panel.
- In your broadcasting software, select Icecast as the server type and enter the connection details from your control panel.
- Test by connecting and listening to your own stream.
- Publish your new stream address and retire the old one.
- Create DJ Accounts for any guest presenters.
Run both stations in parallel for a week if you would rather move gradually. There is no technical reason not to.
Is one more widely used than the other?
Honestly, nobody knows — and it does not matter. Both are free server software that anyone can install privately, so there is no register of who runs what, and any figure quoted for either should be treated with suspicion. The older option has more name recognition because it arrived with Winamp in the 1990s. That is history, not a technical argument.
What matters is that the two are compatible from your listeners' point of view, so the size of either community has no bearing on your station's reach. Your audience finds you by your stream address and your website, not by which server software you chose.
Still have a specific requirement?
Icecast KH is what our standard plans run. If you have a requirement we have not anticipated, open a support ticket and describe it — we would rather understand the underlying need, because in most cases Icecast already covers it.
