BC stations Radio 4 and 5 Live have seen a sharp drop in listener numbers for both their breakfast shows and overall audience over the past year, new figures show.
Radio 4’s flagship Today’s current affairs program, which runs from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m., saw the average audience drop from 6.5 million listeners in July to September 2021 to 5.9 million in the same quarter this year – a 9% drop.
5 Live’s breakfast show recorded an even bigger percentage drop over the period, down 20% from 1.7 million listeners to 1.4 million, coinciding with Rick Edwards to replace Nicky Campbell as the main presenter in November 2021.
The total average audience of Radio 4 has fallen 9% year-over-year from 10.8 million listeners to 9.8 million listeners, while the number of listeners to 5 Live has fallen 18% from 5.9 million to 4. 9 million.
The figures, published by the research firm Rajar, show that all the major BBC broadcasters have seen a drop in listener numbers over the past 12 months.
But the decline is much smaller for Radio 1 and 2, whose total audiences have only fallen slightly by 1%.
And the Radio 2 breakfast show, hosted by Zoe Ballhas seen a 2% increase in listeners year-over-year, from 7.2 million to 7.4 million.
Helen Thomas, head of Radio 2, said: “It’s fantastic that, at a time when many people are leaving and changing their daily routines, the Zoe Ball Breakfast Show bypassed the usual summer trend and saw many more listeners tuning in.”
Greg James’s breakfast show on Radio 1 has fallen 5% from 4.3 million to 4.1 million.
There has been a noticeable drop in the number of listeners to Radio 3, with the average audience falling by just over a fifth (21%) from 2.2 million to 1.7 million, while the number of listeners to the breakfast program has fallen by 16% has fallen from 708,000 to 595,000.
It is the first time year-on-year comparisons have been made since Rajar changed the way it collects public data in response to the Covid-19 pandemic.
It now uses a combination of face-to-face surveys and data collected remotely, rather than the pre-pandemic method, to base its findings entirely on surveys set up through face-to-face interviews.
The latest figures also show that the BBC World Service experienced a jump in listener numbers in the spring of this year, possibly as a result of the war in Ukraine, but viewership has fallen by 15% in the past three months and 14% less than in the same period last year.
GB News saw the average audience increase by 50% from 277,000 in April to June to 415,000 in July to September.
TalkRadio fell 7% over the same period, from 686,000 to 637,000, although the station is up 42% year-over-year from 450,000.