Radio attracts one million more listeners

Year on year figures show an extra million adults are listening to UK radio in the latest RAJAR results when comparing Q3 2013 with Q3 2012.

However, quarter on quarter figures see a drop of one per cent, taking the figure from 90.8 to 89.6% since this time three months ago. The total average number of weekly hours listened to radio remains over a billion, and average hours per listener has gone up from 21.3 to 21.5.

Digital share of all radio listening is up 14% year-on-year but just down on the quarter. Listening to radio via digital platforms is down from 52.5% to 51% this quarter but is up year-on-year in terms of reach, with 51% of the population now tuning in each week.

It’s a similar story for digital listening hours too.

But the good news is that 51% of the population tunes in via a digital platform each week, up 13% year on year, and Kisstory and Kiss Fresh have posted a good first book.

DAB is the most popular device for digital listening – 65% of all digital hours. 24 million adults have access to a DAB digital radio, up 10% year on year.

Ford Ennals, CEO of Digital Radio UK, says: “This quarter shows excellent digital station performance, with outstanding growth from Kiss and debut figures for Kisstory, strong growth from decade stations and BBC Radio 5 Live over the summer. Digital radio offers listeners a wide and increasing range of station choice and the popularity of these stations has bought about a fundamental shift in listening with listening to analogue stations in home now being less than 50%.”

Steve Parkinson, Managing Director, Bauer Media London Radio, says: “It’s a great day for Team Kiss. Kiss Group PD Andy Roberts has been crafting the three digitally-driven flavours of Kiss – KissFMUK, Kiss Fresh and Kisstory – over this last quarter. To have seen such a leap in reach and engagement so quickly is a demonstration of our audience understanding and our ability to deliver great content, on whichever platforms our listeners want.”

The share of analogue listening in home is below 50%, at 49.7%.

Here’s the funky press release infograph from RAJAR!