Beginning in 1965, the occupant of the frequency was licensed to Russellville, Kentucky, in Logan County. Since 1976, it was originally home to CHR/Top 40 formatted WAKQ, which later became a country music-formatted station, and eventually became WBVR-FM. The station was serving Bowling Green, but also attracted listenership in the Nashville radio market. On September 1, 1994, WBVR moved itself to a frequency of 96.7 MHz, a frequency in which was previously used by the now-defunct WMJM, and now licensed to Auburn, with offices located in Bowling Green along with its sister stationsWUHU and WBGN. WBVR now focuses solely on the Bowling Green area.
After WBVR's allocation move on the dial on September 1, 1994, the 101.1 frequency was sold to Clear Channel Communications. A new radio station signed on at 101.1 MHz, which had the callsigns WJZC-FM, with Russellville, Kentucky remaining the official city of license, but began focusing more on the Nashville radio market, although the station still could be picked up in the Bowling Green area. From then until 2000, it was branded as "Jazzy 101" broadcasting a smooth jazz format. It later switched to a contemporary Christian music outlet, and being branded as "The One."
Urban/Hip-hop format
On October 12, 2001, the station's call letters were changed to the current WUBT, and switched to their current Urban contemporary/Hip hop and R&B format. Its new branding was 101.1 The Beat Jamz. Since the switch to urban music, WUBT has become highly rated in the Nashville market, and also picked up good ratings in the Bowling Green radio market, as well as the Clarksville, TN/Hopkinsville, KY radio market. It is currently controlled by iHeart Radio. Its main competitor is longtime Goodlettsville-licensed heritage station WQQK on 92.1 FM. Since July 2007, WUBT is home to the Steve Harvey Morning Show, replacing Doug Banks in the Morning. The call letters were previously assigned to Chicago at 103.5 where it aired an urban oldies format. It only made a small dent in ratings with the exception of when they had legendary Chicago radio personality Larry Lujack doing a Saturday show. Lujack did the show from his house in New Mexico with his co-host, Matt McCann from the Chicago studio. The show was highly rated but the format changed and became KISS FM with a top 40 format.
HD programming
In February 2014, the station's branding changed to "101.1 The Beat," thus dropping "Jamz" in the branding, still broadcasting the same format. Until January 1, 2020, The previous smooth jazz format was on an HD2 subchannel on their HD Radio signal, however it was discontinued on the date mentioned, because of budget constraints at I-Heart Media. WUBT-HD1 simulcasts the traditional analog WUBT 101.1 signal.
