KING World has canned “The Howard Stern Radio Show” after three years of disappointing ratings and not enough national interest.

The one-hour syndicated show will air its last episode this Saturday (11:45 p.m. on Ch. 2).

The much-ballyhooed show debuted in August 1998 and occasionally beat NBC’s “Saturday Night Live” in some markets in the time the two shows went head-to-head.

But “The Howard Stern Radio Show” never quite became a “watercooler” show – one that people talked about at work.

“It did well in urban markets but as time progressed its numbers went down,” says industry analyst Marc Berman of Mediaweek.com. “They had a lot of problems clearing the shows in other markets because of its content.”

“Radio Show” generated immediate criticism when it debuted after critics and viewers complained its content wasn’t much different than Stern’s TV show airing on cable’s E! network.

Stern listened to the criticism, and added some different elements to the King World show, including animation and graphics.

“We’re not talking about a fizzle here – Howard initially did well in New York and Philadelphia and was beating ‘SNL,’ ” Berman says. “But the show was really a lazy attempt to fill an hour in syndication over the weekend.

“The numbers were dropping and obviously it wasn’t making a profit – Howard is not big news right now and he’s lost a lot of his oomph,” Berman says.

“I guess they felt it was time to unload it. They gave him three years – which is more time than a lot of other shows [get].”

Stern’s E! show is unaffected by the cancellation of “The Howard Stern Radio Show.”

A Ch. 2 spokeswoman says “Sports Wrap,” hosted by Gary Apple, will now run from 11:30 p.m. to midnight, with the midnight slot “to be determined.”

King World officials had no comment.