Radio 4 loses 647,000 listeners in three months
BBC Radio 4 has lost about 650,000 listeners in three months, figures reveal.
The station's audience for the last quarter of 2024 was 9.04 million, down from 9.69 million during the summer – a fall of 6.7 per cent.
The corporation suggested audiences are turning to news podcasts instead as it saw a record 253 million plays of its on-demand radio and podcasts via BBC Sounds.
Listeners are also increasingly keen to access longstanding programmes such as The Archers and Desert Island Discs on demand rather than by tuning into a station.
Meanwhile, the weekday audience for the flagship Today programme fell by 112,000 to 5.73 million as listeners got used to a new line-up, with Emma Barnett replacing Martha Kearney.
Radio 4 accounted for six of the top 10 BBC podcasts. Top of the list was Uncanny, an investigation into real-life claims of paranormal activity, followed by the BBC News programmes Newscast and Americast.
However, The Today Podcast, in which the presenters Amol Rajan and Nick Robinson discuss the biggest news stories of the week, did not make the top 10.
On-demand programmes now account for 37 per cent of BBC listener hours.
Radio 4 titles made up eight of the top 10 on-demand programmes, led by The Archers. Desert Island Discs, In Our Time and Drama on 4 are also popular on the catch-up service, along with Radio 4 Extra's Whodunnits, a collection of classic murder mysteries including Miss Marple and Sherlock Holmes.
The Archers has proved surprisingly popular with the under-35s, topping the on-demand list for that age group, above Radio 1's Dance Anthems.
A BBC spokesman said: 'Radio 4 remains the biggest speech radio station by far with nine million listeners, despite an overall declining speech market.
'As is the case with TV, audience habits have shifted to on-demand over recent years with 23 million adults now listening to podcasts weekly. Radio 4 is perfectly placed to offer listeners a brilliant live schedule complemented by the very best podcasts and on-demand radio programmes.'
The BBC said that Radio 4's listener figures during the summer were unusually high because of the news agenda, including the general election, the Southport murders and subsequent riots, the attempted assassination of Donald Trump, and Joe Biden dropping out of the presidential race.
Radio 2 remains the nation's most popular station with 13.6 million listeners, up from 13.3 million in the previous quarter.
Zoe Ball bowed out of her Radio 2 breakfast show with her highest audience in nearly two years.
An average of 6.8 million listeners tuned in during the final quarter of last year, before Ball left at the end of December.
She was replaced by Scott Mills, whose official listening figures will not be available for several months. Ball was the BBC's highest-paid radio DJ on a salary of £950,000.
The most listened-to programme in UK radio is Vernon Kay's mid-morning show on Radio 2. Figures dipped after he took over from Ken Bruce in 2023 but are now 7.2 million – about a million below Bruce's Radio 2 audience.
Bruce moved to Greatest Hits Radio, where he has about four million listeners.
Boom Radio, launched in 2021 to cater for older audiences – many of them disillusioned with Radio 2's quest for youth – now has its highest-ever audience of 706,000 listeners. The station operates with a programme spend of just 1 per cent of Radio 2's budget.
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