Another radio record as over 50 million people tune in each week

Radio continues to break records as the latest audience research from RAJAR shows over 50 million people listening each week.

Headlines:

• BBC Radio 1 adds almost a million listeners
• BBC Local Radio network increases weekly reach and hours with Radio London up 32%
• Ken Bruce now reaches a record 4m listeners on Greatest Hits Radio, up 1m year-on-year
• Capital London back up to almost 2m but Heart remains the largest London commercial station with 2.1m
• Top London stations; Magic and KISS drop (11% and 20% respectively) whilst Smooth gets a record audience up 28%
• The new Capital Breakfast adds a quarter of a million listeners
• Increases for Capital Chill, Smooth Chill and Smooth Relax
• Magic at the Musicals enjoys 64% increase over 12 months
• Scala Radio bows out losing 20% weekly reach year-on-year ahead of name change
• Virgin Radio 80s plus grows by 49%
• BBC Asian Network is up 27.5% quarter on quarter
• Greatest Hits Radio (Tayside & Fife, previously Tay 2) doubles its audience year-on-year
• Impressive increases for Nation Radio Scotland and other Nation stations
• Sunrise Smooth debuts with a weekly reach of 38,000 listeners
• Smart speaker listening continues to grow and now accounts for 17% of total listening
• See all radio station’s figures via RadioToday.co.uk’s graphs here

The figures for Q2 2024 continue to highlight how audiences value one of the oldest mediums in the world, as the gap between commercial radio and BBC radio gets slightly bigger.

Commercial radio continues to lead the market, with a record listening share of 55% compared to the BBC’s 42.6%. This marks a significant increase from the same period two years ago when commercial radio’s share was 49% (Q2 2022).

Commercial radio’s audience in the UK has surpassed 40 million for the first time, reaching a record-breaking 40.5 million weekly listeners. This new milestone breaks the previous record of 39.7 million set in Q1 2024.

For all radio, smart speaker listening continues to grow and now accounts for 17% of total listening, an 18% increase year-on-year. Smart speaker listening on commercial radio continues to drive this growth, now at 20.8%, up from 17.4% compared to the same period last year.

Radiocentre’s CEO Matt Payton said: “It’s great to see these record-breaking figures confirm that commercial radio is reaching over 40 million listeners for the first time. These excellent results are a reflection of the investment and innovation in our sector. This increase in listeners, alongside last week’s industry forecasts predicting improved revenue growth for the sector, mean the outlook for the year ahead is exceptionally positive for advertisers.”

At the BBC, 32m people tune in each week for live output across the stations, with a share of 42.6%.

There was a boost for Radio 1 (almost a million extra) and Greg James’ Breakfast Show, which remains the biggest breakfast show in the UK for 15-24 year olds.

BBC Radio 2 remains the UK’s favourite radio station with Vernon Kay presenting the UK’s biggest radio show and Zoe Ball presenting the most popular breakfast show.

Charlotte Moore, BBC Chief Content Officer, said: “I’m delighted to see the strength of the audio landscape with a record number of people listening to radio and podcasts across the UK.

“As we head towards a fantastic summer of sport it is excellent to already see such a big increase for 5 Live and 5 Sports Extra with more world class coverage to come. BBC Radio 4 speech programming continues to dominate on BBC Sounds, showcasing our thriving digital strategy.”

Please note the Q2 2024 UK population (adults 15+)  is estimated to have increased by 1.3 million adults to 57.6 million adults, so please be aware of this when checking comparative results.

GLOBAL

• Global remains the number one commercial radio company in the UK with 28.6 million listeners
• Global has a new record share of 26.5%.
• Hours are 277 million, making it the UK’s most popular commercial radio group.
• Heart strengthens its position as the number one commercial radio brand as it celebrates a record breaking 12.8 million weekly listeners, adding 1.6 million in the last year and increasing in reach, hours and share year-on-year.
• The Heart brand has 4.5 million more listeners than Radio 1.
• Heart Breakfast with Jamie Theakston and Amanda Holden is the biggest commercial radio and breakfast show in the UK with 4.2 million weekly listeners. The show has increased its reach, hours and share in the last 12 months and beats Radio 1 Breakfast by more than 150,000 listeners.
• Heart 00s (1 million) and Heart Dance (1.1 million) have achieved their highest listening figures to date increasing in reach, hours and share in the last quarter.
• Capital reaches its highest ever number, a record breaking 9.1 million weekly listeners adding 793,000 listeners in the last year.
• Capital Breakfast with Jordan North, Chris Stark and Sian Welby reaches a huge 2.8 million listeners in Jordan’s first RAJAR since joining the station. The show has added a massive 261,000 listeners in the last quarter and is up in all metrics – reach, hours and share.
• Capital Dance celebrates highest ever listening figures with 1.1 million listeners adding 124,000 listeners in the last quarter.
• Capital XTRA, home to the biggest hip-hop and RnB, has smashed its previous record, and now more than 2.1 million people tune in across the UK every week. It has increased in reach, hours and share year-on-year and quarter-on-quarter. It has more than 1.2 million listeners than the audience of BBC Radio 1Xtra.
• Capital XTRA Breakfast with Robert Bruce and Shayna Marie has 620,000 listeners, increasing in reach, hours and share year-on-year.
• Smooth Radio celebrates its highest ever audience figures, with a record 7.2 million people listening each week, adding 1.3 million in the past year. Its reach, hours and share have increased both quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year.
• Smooth London celebrates a record 1.2 million listeners each week.
• Smooth’s Kate Garraway has her best-ever figures, reaching a record 2.9 million listeners each week – adding 559,000 in the past 12 months.
• Smooth Country also celebrates its highest ever figures, with a new weekly audience of 426,000.
• Smooth Chill has grown its audience, now reaching 531,000 people.
• Smooth Relax, in its second set of results, has increased its audience to 494,000 weekly listeners.
• LBC has added 227,000 listeners in the past year, reaching more than 3.3 million people each week.
• LBC’s Nick Ferrari at Breakfast reaches 1.3 million listeners across the UK each week and is London’s number one commercial breakfast show in hours and share.
• LBC News has a weekly audience of 981,000 people tuning in for the latest breaking news.
• Radio X celebrates its highest ever weekly reach with 2.3 million listeners tuning in every week, 695,000 more than Virgin Radio.
• At breakfast on Radio X, The Chris Moyles Show alone reaches 1.2 million listeners, increasing in reach, hours and share year-on-year.
• Johnny Vaughan at Drive celebrates his highest ever reach, smashing through the 1 million mark for the first time.
• Radio X Classic Rock also celebrates its highest ever weekly audience of 299,000 listeners increasing in reach, hours and share quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year.
• Classic FM has increased its audience in the last quarter to 4.5 million weekly listeners, while Radio 3 sees a drop of 162,000 listeners for the same period.
• Gold has a weekly audience of 1.8 million, adding 24,000 listeners in the past quarter.
• Capital XTRA Reloaded celebrates a new high for the fifth quarter in a row – it now has 635,000 weekly listeners.
• The Official Big Top 40 from Global is the UK’s biggest chart show and continues to grow, reaching 1.7 million listeners every week across Capital and Heart, adding a further 51,000 listeners in the last quarter, increasing in reach, hours and share year-on-year.

BAUER

• Bauer Media Audio UK has achieved another record reach of more than 24m weekly listeners tuning into its portfolio of owned and partner stations each week (+5.4% YoY).
• The Hits Radio Network is celebrating its biggest ever audience of 7m weekly listeners (+7.8% YoY). The rebrand of stations across England and Wales has boosted Hits Radio to now reach 4.8m weekly listeners. LGBTQ+ station Hits Radio Pride records 300k in its first book.
• Greatest Hits Radio has added 1.7m listeners in the last year, with 7.5m weekly listeners (+30% YoY). Simon Mayo has the biggest commercial drivetime show, Ken Bruce now reaches a record 4m listeners and Rossie at Breakfast now reaches a record 3m listeners a week.
• Hits Radio and Greatest Hits Radio combined (the Hits Radio Portfolio) now reach 13.2m listeners (+16.3% YoY) and 15.1m (+11.8% YoY) when partner stations are included.
• The Absolute Radio Network secures its biggest ever audience of 5.6M listeners (+2.4% YoY), and with country music further crossing over into the mainstream this year, Absolute Radio Country has gained a nearly 30% increase in audience with 458k weekly listeners (+27.9% YoY).
• The Magic Radio Network has 4.1m listeners (+8.1% YoY), with a record number of listeners to Magic Soul which now has over 600k weekly listeners (+33.1% YoY).
• The KISS Network reaches 4m listeners a week, and KISSTORY is the No.1 digital commercial station with 2.4m listeners.
• Over a third of Bauer’s listening is now via connected devices including smart speakers, web and app, with a further 50% of listening on DAB. Bauer is also home to three of the top five digital commercial stations, #1 KISSTORY, #2 Absolute Radio, and #5 Absolute 80s.

NEWS UK

• News Broadcasting has achieved record-breaking weekly reach, up 7.0% year-on-year to 6.8m
• The group also delivers best-ever listening hours, up 4.2% year-on-year to 45.9m
• The talkSPORT network also delivered another record-breaking result with best-ever reach up 9.0% to 3.7m listeners and best-ever listening hours of 24.0m – up 10.2% year-on-year
• News Broadcasting – including talkSPORT, Virgin Radio UK, Talk and Times Radio – remains the UK’s most digital broadcaster, with 84% of output delivered on digital channels
• Meanwhile News Broadcasting continues to lead on video consumption: with 58.6m UK views for its content across Facebook & YouTube in June 2024

NATION BROADCASTING

• Nation Broadcasting Group listening hours were up over 50% on the same quarter in 2023.
• Across the UK, Nation Radio saw its weekly reach of listeners increase to a record high of nearly three quarters of a million, with 741,000 tuning in each week.
• In London, Nation Radio broke the 200k weekly reach milestone for the first time, with 208,000 listeners tuning in, making it one of the largest digital radio stations in the hugely competitive London market.
• On the South Coast, Nation Radio South saw strong growth in total listening hours. Its reach was steady at 101,000, with its listening hours increasing by over 50% to 873,000 compared with the previous year result.
• In the North-East, Nation radio reported for the first time across a wider area and achieved a gain of 7,000 listeners on the previous quarter, with listening hours soaring by nearly 200%.
• Nation Radio Wales was up substantially in weekly reach on the same quarter last year. It recorded a gain of 47,000 weekly listeners and a 40% increase in weekly listening hours in the same period.
• Nation Radio Scotland recorded a record reach, passing the 150k weekly listener milestone for the first time, with a weekly reach of 152,000. This was a gain of 57,000 listeners on the same period last year.

BBC

• BBC Radio 1 has 8.7m listeners aged 10+ and the Radio 1 Breakfast Show with Greg James (Mon-Fri) had 4.4m 10+ listeners.
• BBC Radio 2 has 13.3m listeners with 6.4m tuning in for The Zoe Ball Breakfast Show. Vernon Kay has the biggest UK radio show with 6.7m listeners.
• BBC Radio 3 has 1.8m listeners.
• BBC Radio 4 has 9m listeners with 5.6m tuning in for The Today programme (Mon-Sat).
• BBC Radio 5 Live posted a reach of 5.4m listeners.
• BBC Radio 1Xtra has 829k listeners, BBC Radio 4 Extra had 1.4m, BBC 5 Sports Extra had 1.1m, BBC Radio 6 Music had 2.7m, and
  BBC Asian Network had 644k.
• The BBC World Service was listened to by 1.2m people
• Local Radio increases its total audience across England despite major changes to presenters and programmes in recent years with 4.8m listeners this quarter.

ELSEWHERE

• Boom Radio has increased its listening by 14% over the last year, taking it to 621,000 adults each week, listening for 12.1 hours per week.
• GB News Radio has grown by 63 per cent in the past 12 months to 518,000 people per week, giving it a bigger audience than Times Radio, which is now on 478,000.
• Sunrise Smooth debuts with a weekly reach of 38,000 listeners.
• Gold Manchester increases audience even after its AM transmitter is switched off!

Looking for more RAJAR info, check out Matt Deegan’s blog here and Adam Bowie’s write-up, here.

QUOTES

Ashley Tabor-King CBE, Founder & Executive President of Global, said: “To have again added another million listeners for the second quarter in a row, now reaching over 28 million listeners each week, is simply incredible! It’s fantastic news for our creative industries that radio and audio is thriving in this way, with more people listening than ever before. The ease of connected listening on smart speakers and quality apps like our own Global Player – is helping to fuel growth, alongside consistent, innovative, quality content.

“Commercial radio is an incredible promotional partner to artists and brands, helping to reach fans and audiences at a phenomenal scale. Thanks to every globaller who works so hard to make everyone’s day brighter, and to every single listener that chooses and trusts our radio brands every week.”

James Rea, Chief Broadcasting & Content Officer at Global, said: “What an absolutely fantastic gold-medal winning RAJAR quarter this is for Global! It’s incredible to see so many record breaking performances. Congratulations to Jordan North and the whole Capital team for a truly outstanding result. It’s also fantastic that Heart, Smooth and Radio X continue to grow to new highs.

“We have the very best team at Global and I’m so proud of how they continue to reinvigorate and reinvent to drive our audiences forward. This is truly a moment to celebrate.”

Simon Myciunka, CEO for Bauer Media Audio UK said, ‘The reach, resilience and reinvention of commercial radio has led to another set of record-breaking RAJAR figures. At Bauer Media Audio UK, our continued growth is down to delivering brands that resonate with our audiences and advertisers. It’s our team’s commitment to excellence, coupled with smart distribution and investment that drives our success and sets the stage for an even brighter future.’

Gary Stein, Director of Audio for Bauer Media Audio UK said, ‘What another stunning set of results for Bauer Media Audio UK. In a quarter where we rebranded 16 stations across England and Wales to Hits Radio, I’m delighted this has resulted in a record reach for Hits Radio and the wider network. It’s also great to see Absolute Radio Network hit new highs, and Ken Bruce continue to grow audience, with Greatest Hits Radio extending its position as the UK’s most listened to commercial station. A huge well done to our brilliant teams up and down the country.’

Nation Broadcasting’s founder Jason Bryant said: ‘In some of the UK’s biggest and most competitive markets we are seeing encouraging audience growth for Nation Radio. I anticipate further growth as programme enhancements take effect and we continue to develop Nation as a successful, independent, and recognisable national media brand.”

Phil Riley, CEO of Boom Radio: “These results clearly show there is simply no need for the BBC to use public money to launch a virtually identical service. It would simply be a spoiler project effectively designed to kill off Boom.”

Aled Haydn Jones (Head of BBC Radio 1) said: “I’m very proud that Radio 1 has increased its audience by 461,000 taking our weekly listeners to 8.7 million, in addition to increases across the board for our core audience of 15-24s. These results, coupled with Radio 1 Breakfast with Greg James continuing to be the number 1 breakfast show for young audiences in the country and further increases across YouTube, iPlayer and socials, demonstrate why Radio 1 is the number 1 station for young people across the UK.”

Helen Thomas, Head of Radio 2, said, “We’re incredibly proud that Radio 2 remains the UK’s favourite station with over 13.3 million people tuning in each week, and delighted that The Zoe Ball Breakfast Show and Vernon Kay on weekday mid-mornings continue to be the UK’s most listened to shows.”

Tony Lit MBE, MD Sunrise Radio Group comments, “Following the release of Rajar Q2 2024 this morning I’m pleased to report the continued growth of our group of commercial Asian Radio stations both in London and Nationally. The Sunrise Radio Group National which includes Sunrise National DAB, Sunrise London 963/972 & Sunrise Smooth DAB London has now broken the 400k weekly reach barrier. Sunrise Radio remains the undisputed South Asian commercial radio market leader in London and Nationally. I’m also delighted with Sunrise Smooth’s (DAB London) debut Rajar, with a weekly reach of 38,000.

Surjit Singh Ghuman MBE, Managing Director of Panjab Radio said, “The release of the Q2/24 RAJAR data shows that Panjab Radio once again delivering the highest number of hours against any other Asian stations in London. Our overhaul of programming in 2024 is continuing to reap dividends.

Raj Baddhan, CEO of Lyca Radio Network, stated, “These are fantastic figures for the Lyca Radio Network. Not only are we up quarter-on-quarter but also year-on-year for both Lyca Radio and Lyca Gold. The stations continue to grow, with our award-winning, high-quality shows. The tremendous response to our new station, Lyca Radio – Greater Manchester (formerly known as Asian Sound Radio), has paved the way for further expansion. Watch this space for more exciting news. A huge thanks to my wonderful team for their ongoing efforts, our advertisers for their support, and our dear listeners for making the Lyca Group stations (consisting of Lyca Radio & Lyca Gold) the No.1 Asian radio network in Greater London.”

News UK EVP, President of Broadcasting, Scott Taunton, said: “These new results represent the eighth quarter of record hours for our national brands! News Broadcasting continues to set the pace in the digital space, demonstrating the brilliance of our brands in engaging more and more people, for longer, across more platforms than ever. Special shout out to the talkSPORT team: these results recognise they are, hands down, the destination for live sport and livelier opinion.

“Our digital-first growth strategy is well on track. Beyond these RAJAR results it’s worth noting that video content from News Broadcasting brands was viewed 58.6m times across Facebook and YouTube in June, far more than any other radio group. Our talented teams – on and off air – will continue to drive that innovation and growth.”

GB News’ Commercial Director Nicole O’Shea said: “These figures underline the strong continued growth of GB News Radio across the United Kingdom. To do this in the space of just three years is a great achievement and we’re now reaching more listeners than ever all over the UK.

“Overtaking Times Radio is a milestone moment for GB News but our aim is to build on this success and to reach out and connect with an even larger audience.”