BBC left reeling as Radio 1 Breakfast show beaten in listener figures for first time with Virgin Radio soaring up charts
BBC radio bosses were left reeling yesterday after the latest listening figures slumped across all stations — including for some flagship shows.
Meanwhile commercial radio is roaring ahead — with thousands more tuning in to Virgin Radio and Heart FM.
The industry figures for the last quarter of 2023 made grim reading for BBC top brass, with commercial stations adding one million listeners year-on-year to reach a total of 39.1 million people.
By comparison Radio 1 lost almost two million listeners over the same period, with 31.3 million now tuning in. Amanda Holden and Jamie Theakston’s breakfast show on Heart also overtook Greg James’ Radio 1 show.
According to audience polls by Rajar, 3.99 million listeners chose Holden and Theakston over 3.92 million for Greg.
Greg’s figure is boosted to 4.3m if listeners aged 10-15 are included, something commercial stations don’t record.
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Radio 2, 3, 4, 5 Live and 6 Music also lost listeners. Radio 4’s audience was down ten per cent, while its flagship programme Today also shed audience members. In 2022 6.2 million people tuned into Radio 5 Live but that fell to 5.9 million.
Holden and Theakston have been at the helm of Heart’s breakfast show since 2019. A source said: “This is a real kick in the teeth for the BBC. One of the biggest problems is that Amanda and Jamie — Amanda in particular — are brilliant in the art of self-promotion.
“They use social media so effectively. And given these latest stats, it’s clearly paying off.”
The Chris Evans Breakfast Show on Virgin saw its reach up seven per cent year-on-year and hours listened up 11 per cent.
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Virgin Radio network reached 1.8 million people, with 11.6 million listening hours, up 4.7 per cent.
BBC chief content officer Charlotte Moore said yesterday: “There’s fierce competition for people’s time and with the success of global streamers and digital listening reaching record levels, we know that audience habits are changing.”
