“Parents are the gate keepers for access to young children. They feel concerned about safety and screen time. We need to address this on our platforms while also providing entertainment,” said Henriette Høj Gharib CEO of Podster ApS at RadioDays Europe 2025.

Audiobook producers can benefit from this trend by providing the right kind of audio content for children.

The British National Literacy Trust 2024, asked more than 37,000 8 to 18 year-olds who said they listen to audiobooks and podcasts in their free time about their attitudes and feelings about listening. In a year where we saw the lowest levels of reading enjoyment since 2019, findings show that many children and young people continued to enjoy, and were inspired by, listening to audio.

The key findings are summarised here:

• 2 in 5 (42.3%) of children and young people aged 8 to 18 told us they enjoyed listening to audio in their free time in 2024. This is a slight increase on levels of listening enjoyment in 2023 (39.4%).
• In 2024, a higher percentage of children and young people said they enjoyed listening than enjoyed reading in their free time (42.3% vs 34.6%). This is the first time that more enjoyed listening than reading since we first started asking about listening in 2020.
• Slightly more boys than girls told us they enjoyed listening to audio (43.4% vs 40.4%). This gender gap in listening enjoyment is much smaller than in reading (28.2% boys enjoyed reading in 2024 vs 40.5% girls) and writing (22.1% boys vs 34.6% girls).
• Almost 2 in 5 (37.5%) of children and young people said listening to audio had sparked their interest in reading books. Compared with those who didn’t enjoy listening, more of those who enjoyed listening to audio also enjoyed reading in their free time (52.4% vs. 36.0%).
• Half of children and young people said listening to audio enabled them to better understand a story or subject (48.4%), made them use their imagination more than when watching videos (52.9%) and helped them relax or feel better when they were stressed or anxious (52.0%).

At a time when reading for enjoyment levels are at an all-time low, the findings suggest that listening to audio formats, including audiobooks and podcasts, has the potential to support learning, wellbeing and reading engagement in many children and young people.

According to aggregate sales data from the Bookwire platform, 90% of German audiobook revenues derive sales from fiction content. Within this category, children’s and young adult content generates 44% of revenue, the highest non English language sales.

In the US, according to 2024 APA research, more than half of the US population 18+ has now listened to an audiobook. The average was 4.8 audiobooks listened to in the last year, up from the 4.0 averaged in 2023. Children’s audiobook listening remains strong, with 53% percent of audiobook listeners with children saying their kids also listen to audiobooks. According to 77% of these parents, a key benefit of audiobooks is giving their children a break from screens.

“Not all audiobooks were written as a book first,” said Christian Kessler Head of Audio at DACHBookwire.

Here are some other successful European examples of converged formats:

4. Meet AIDA – AI written content sent in by kids, human voiced, which is in Spotify’s top 10.

5. Book, Podcast series and Audiobook

Henriette said, “Children are an impatient audience. Story is the key and it can travel any where.”

Greece is taking advantage of this trend. “In Greece we’ve started a children’s radio station to keep the next generation, “ said Alexandra Dastalopoulos CEO of Front Stage Entertainment the leading radio group in Greece. “It’s experienced huge growth since launched.”