It is actually worse than that, all phones have an FM tuner built-in to receive emergency alerts from various nations. At one point, I forget who (possibly Sinclair?, iirc it was a large American broadcast company), attempted to pass legislation in the US to force the OEMs to allow access to the chips which somehow failed. I believe most androids that are rooted are able to access the FM radio irregardless, but I am unfamiliar of the minutia involved. I’d estimate 99% of iPhones in use have an FM radio chip, I believe only Sprint (a defunct American carrier) ever shipped with FM radio available.
Yeah the cheaper phones usually still have it.
Why does a higher “quality” lead to less features?
It is actually worse than that, all phones have an FM tuner built-in to receive emergency alerts from various nations. At one point, I forget who (possibly Sinclair?, iirc it was a large American broadcast company), attempted to pass legislation in the US to force the OEMs to allow access to the chips which somehow failed. I believe most androids that are rooted are able to access the FM radio irregardless, but I am unfamiliar of the minutia involved. I’d estimate 99% of iPhones in use have an FM radio chip, I believe only Sprint (a defunct American carrier) ever shipped with FM radio available.
ETA Apple Support Article for phones with FM enabled and Decade old NPR article explaining some of the situation