WWRL was first placed on the air in 1926 by William Reuman, broadcasting from Woodside, Queens on a frequency of 1160 kHz. After a number of frequency changes, it moved to 1600 kHz in 1941. The station featured ethnic programming throughout much of its history, with Spanish and Black-oriented shows predominating by the 1950's. WWRL became a R&B hits station in 1964, and after a sale in 1982, a Christian talk format was introduced. An R&b oldies format was heard from 1997 to 2003.

  In early 2003, WWRL replaced most of its weekday music programming with talk shows. Between September 1, 2006 and January, 2010, WWRL carried Air America programming to fill much of its weekday schedule. On January 1, 2014, the station discontinued its talk programming and adoopted a Spanish-language Regional Mexican music format as "La Invasora". The station`s format was changed to Indian/South Asian programming in 2016, and in 2020, iHeartMedia launched Black Information Network programming.