KUOW-FM (94.9 MHz) is a National Public Radio member station in Seattle, Washington. It is the largest of the three full-fledged NPR member stations in the Seattle and Tacoma media market, with two Tacoma-based stations, KNKX and KVTI being the others. It is a service of the University of Washington, but is operated by KUOW Puget Sound Public Radio, a nonprofit community organization. Studios are located on University Way in Seattle's University District, while the transmitter is on Capitol Hill.

KUOW went on the air in 1952 on 90.5 FM.^[1] Its transmitter was on the University of Washington campus atop the Administration Building, now Gerberding Hall. In 1958, Dorothy Stimson Bullitt moved KING-FM to 98.1 and gifted KING's 94.9 FM transmitter and antenna to the Edison Vocational School. That same year, KUOW started using the 94.9 FM transmitter operated by Edison. KUOW is one of the few public radio (or any non-commercial educational) stations in the United States broadcasting on a frequency outside of the reserved band (88–92 MHz; Seattle is also home to KING-FM on 98.1, which became a non-commercial station in 2010).^[2] From its 1954 sign-on until 1987, KUOW was a sister station to educational/NET television outlet (and now PBS member station) KCTS-TV (channel 9); the university spun off KCTS in 1987 and became a community licensee.

In the 1960s, however, KUOW began branching out, adding more news programming. It was a charter member of NPR in 1970. In 1992, it changed format from music to news and information, and in 1999 it moved off campus to its current location on University Way.^[3] Also in 1999, UW outsourced the station's operation to Puget Sound Public Radio.

In late March 2020, KUOW "made an editorial decision to stop airing White House briefings on the coronavirus pandemic live on a daily basis."^[4] A statement from the station asserted that the decision was not politically based, and their "greater concern was the potential impact of false information on the health and safety of our community."^[4]

For several weeks in January and February 2022, a technical glitch with HD Radio caused the infotainment systems of Mazda vehicles made between 2014 and 2017 to only play KUOW's signal and flash repeatedly. Mazda blamed the issue on a missing file extension in KUOW's station logo; KUOW had ruled out a theory that the rollout of 5G networks had interfered with the existing 3G data received by infotainment systems.^[5][6]

KUOW reported that the station served an average of 413,600 listeners each week in 2019, down from 447,100 in 2018.^[7] The station also reported that their on-demand audio and podcasts received 2.9 million downloads total.^[7]

KUOW-FM broadcasts in HD.^[8] On March 7, 2018, KUOW made the decision to discontinue the HD2, HD3, and HD4 subchannels. "KUOW2" continues to be transmitted on translator K214EW 90.7 and KQOW-HD2 in Bellingham, while KUOW Jazz was discontinued.^[9] The main analog signal continues to be simulcast on HD1.

KUOW is also carried on the following satellite and broadcast translator stations to improve reception of the station:

• KQOW 90.3 FM Bellingham
• KUOW 1340 AM Tumwater and Olympia

For KUOW's fiscal year ending June 30, 2019, the station reported total revenue of $18,732,286 and total expenses of $18,339,864, for a net gain of $392,422.^[10] Its sources of revenue were:^[7]

• 68% individuals
• 24% businesses
• 6% institutions such as Corporation for Public Broadcasting and University of Washington
• 2% other expenses such as interest and dividends or donated services and supplies

KUOW broadcast the Washington Talking Book and Braille Library's Evergreen Radio Reading Service to blind and handicapped listeners on its 67kHz subcarrier, until the service's closure on August 15, 2014.^[11] KUOW was one of three major FM stations in Washington to do so; KPBX-FM in Spokane and KFAE-FM in Yakima were the others.^[12]