Q4 Rajar Figures – Summary

The latest Rajar figures reveal that the BBC has extended its lead over commercial radio to 1.3%. The BBC obtained 49.6% of total audience share, compared with commercial radio’s 48.3%. BBC’s radio share is up more than 2% year-on-year.

Radio 1’s reach was down to 10.7 million from 11.2 million in the previous quarter while Radio 2’s share is up half a point to 12.8% this quarter. Overall all national commercial radio saw its share of listening fall from 10.7% to 10.1. Atlantic 252’s share fell by 0.6% to 2.7% and Virgin’s share fell to 2.4% in quarter 4. Classic FM’s share was down 2 percentage points quarter-on-quarter while Talk Radio increased its share to 1.9%.

Total hours listened to radio in the London region has fallen for the majority of the commercial radio stations. For the second Rajar quarter in a row, Sunrise radio has recorded the biggest fall, down by 43.87% in comparison to Rajar Quarter 4 1995.

Total Capital Radio’s weekly reach dropped to 3.4 million while 95.8 Capital FM showed a loss of 7.34% on the same period last year. 963 Liberty (formerly Viva! 963 am) showed the greatest weekly reach increase within the London area with an increase of 66.1% on 1995.

The weekly reach of all local commercial radio stations has fallen from 52% to 49% year-on-year, while share of listening fell 0.9% points from 39.1% to 38.2%. Overall, gold stations seemed to perform particularly well. GWR’s Classic Gold 774 increased its weekly reach by 26.98% while The Radio Partnership’s Great Yorkshire Gold grew its reach by almost 40% to 120,000. The group’s Amber Radio however recorded one of the largest drops in reach with a fall of 43.38% to 154,000.

Kiss 102 increased its reach only slightly by 1.66% to 245,000 while Heart 100.7 FM fared better with a rise of 26.63% to 504,000. Fame 1521 increased its reach by 36.36% and West Sound grew by 36.97%.