RAJAR Q3 2009: Rajar tracks surge in number of people listening to digital radio

The share of audience listening to radio digitally was up to 21.1% from 18.7% in the same quarter last year.

The commercial network with the most listeners overall is Heart, with an audience share of 5.9%, up 7.4% year on year. Classic FM comes in second with a share of 3.7%, a decline of 1.8% year on year. Galaxy, the Heart stablemate also owned by Global Radio, was up 3.6% year on year with a share of 2.6%.

Magic performed well in the quarter, up 7.9% year on year, giving it an audience share of 2.4%. Smooth Radio's share grew 1.1% year on year, to 2.1%.

Total Real Radio enjoyed the biggest change in reach for national commercial station, with an uplift of 47.8% year on year, giving it a reach of 2.1%.

Other stations to experience a significant rise included digital stations Heat Radio, up 36%, and Chill, up 27.9%. LBC's share increased by 28%.

Total radio listening time was up 1.4% in the third quarter year on year, with the BBC taking most of the extra listeners, up 1.8% for the period. All commercial stations saw a total rise of 0.1% year on year.

In London, Heart overtook its sister station, Capital, as most popular station. Capital Breakfast presenters Johnny Vaughan and Lisa Snowdon lost more than a 10th of their audience.

For the 11th consecutive quarter, Bauer Radio's Magic 105.4 retained the top spot among local commercial stations in London for weekly reach, with 2.01m listeners. This was a fall of 2.2% on the previous quarter, but up 6.6% year on year.

This article was first published on marketingmagazine.co.uk