The station relaunched in March 2014 as a partly-automated service, broadcasting in fewer areas, after many of Gold's local AM/DAB frequencies were transferred to Smooth Radio.

The original presenters on the early incarnation of Capital Gold included Tony Blackburn, Kenny Everett and David Hamilton.

She co-hosted the new "Gold" breakfast show with James Cannon until December 2010; with Blackburn having quit the network completely, joining Smooth Radio.

A condition of Global's takeover was that the local stations in Birmingham, Coventry, Wolverhampton and Worcester had to be sold and were operated under a franchise to Orion Media.

Orion Media ended the franchise agreement and relaunched its Gold West Midlands stations as Free Radio 80s[4] on 4 September 2012.

The announcement said Gold would become available again on DAB in Manchester, Birmingham, Ayr, Bournemouth, Cambridge, Cornwall, Exeter/Torbay/North Devon, Kent, Norwich, Peterborough, Plymouth, Reading/Basingstoke, Southend/Chelmsford, on the Sussex Coast and in Swindon.

The relaunch as a national service was accompanied by a new breakfast show hosted by DJ James Bassam, joining from sister station Capital.

Following the relaunch of Connect FM as part of Smooth East Midlands on 1 October 2019, Gold programming returned to the AM and local DAB platforms in Cambridgeshire and Northamptonshire, reversing the change made to these frequencies in 2014.