I have seen a bunch of post for the 2nd gen with poor FM reception, but nothing on the 3rd gens.
I have tried swapping out to a different antenna that didn't help.
Normal FM signal just kind of comes and goes, HD radio reception works fine.

Is this a common issue on the 3rd gens?

Side Note, The whole radio user interface is pretty awful. Even basic functions like setting radio presets don't work as intended. Crazy German engineers...

 

I thought I was the only one who felt that way. The preset usage isn't very intuitive. Matter of fact, even though I did a reset, I later found out that some of the presets were still programmed to call the original owner's friends.

 

You cannot “swap out” antennas, as the FM antenna is built into the rear glass. The mast antenna on the roof is for AM only.

 

Some stations do come in fine, there is just a handful of them that are terrible and keep cutting in and out even while not moving.
The stations all work perfectly in all the other cars we have so I guess I have to say its just a bad design in the radio.

 

The MINI has a radio? lol, don't think I've used it for more than 10 seconds. You can buy signal boosters pretty cheaply if you want to give that a try. Generally I find BMW/MINI audio related components to be an afterthought. Cheap cars from other makes blow them away.

 

I guess we'll just pony up for the Sat radio and wont have to deal with the crap FM reception...