BBC Breaks Internet Radio Listener Records

BBC radio listeners tuned in to a record 4.2 million hours of content via the internet during January, the Corporation has revealed, with nearly 7 million unique users visiting its radio websites in the same period, a rise of 70% year on year.

The BBC’s digital-only services spearheaded the increase in online listening, with 1Xtra, 6 Music, Asian Network and BBC 7 all reporting record on-demand listening, totaling 1.2 million hours.

6 Music saw its combined live and on-demand listening top half a million hours, while the Asian Network’s website proved popular, with its feature of the Top 40 Soundtracks helping to push its total of weekly unique users over 60,000 for the first time.

1Xtra gave another impressive performance, with more than half a million hours of online listening and 70,000 on-demand requests for the M1X Show. Elsewhere, the rise of BBC 7 continued, with unique users passing 300,000 for the first time to double last January’s total.

Radio 3 surpassed its previous unique user record by 90,000 users in January, meanwhile Radio 4 beat its highest total with unique users showing sustained growth across all genres.

Trials at the end of last year by the BBC revealed that BBC Radio content made available for download was also a success, with more than 70,000 downloads of Radio 4’s In Our Time during November, as tech-savvy listeners welcomed the latest ‘podcasting’ service (see BBC Claims Success For Radio Download Service).

BBC: 020 8743 8000 www.bbc.co.uk

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