The late rapper, Francis Magalona, worked with the station beginning in 1994[4] through his program, "The Word-up Show", which aired on Saturday nights.

[5] From May 2000, in what was the first in the country's broadcasting, the station simulcast a Tuesday primetime variety show of IBC-13, DMZTV, whose format is similar to that of MTV.

[6][7] The station was among those assets of the Intercontinental Broadcasting Corporation which had been sequestered by the Aquino administration through the newly-formed Presidential Commission on Good Government (PCGG); with the network's privatization being planned since mid-1990s.

[8][9] The station was eventually acquired by the Vera Group though Blockbuster Broadcasting System, Inc. in a bidding held by the Presidential Commission on Good Government in December 2000.

Wave 89.1 began regular broadcast on March 1, 2001, simultaneous with a media launch in a hotel in Makati.

It was officially launched on April 24, 2024 under the Adventist World Radio network, though occasionally dubbed as AWR on Wave 89.1.