First 2012 UK Rajar ratings released

The latest UK ratings show that Capital FM is once again London’s biggest commercial radio station, now with 2.3 million weekly listeners.

 

Capital FM had 2.25 million average weekly listeners in the final quarter of 2011, up 14.9% year on year, according to the latest official Rajar figures published last Thursday.

 

Capital also had its biggest weekly reach since the first three months of 2004, when it had an audience of 2.34 million.

 

Ashley Tabor, Founder & Executive President said: “I’m delighted to see Capital performing so well in London and across the UK. This demonstrates the network’s growing popularity and reinforces our strategy of national brands delivered locally. Congratulations to the entire team.”

 

BBC 6 Music, the digital station that the BBC tried to remove, has celebrated its biggest audience of nearly 1.5 million listeners on the eve of its 10th birthday.

 

With a 1.2% share of the total UK radio audience, 6 Music is only slightly behind BBC Radio 3, which has a 1.3% share of the audience. However, Radio 3 had substantially more listeners, with an average weekly audience of 2.09 million.

 

Among the other BBC stations, BBC Radio 4 marginally missed out on a new high, up 5% year on year to 10.83 million, just behind BBC Radio 1, which was up 2.1% on 2010 to 11.67 million.

BBC Radio 2 remained by some distance the UK’s most popular station, up 2.3% year on year to 14.27 million.

 

Heart radio station is now in third place behind Magic. At Heart, 11 of the 14 stations are down in numbers (including London), with only Heart Solent and Heart Four Counties attracting new listeners. In the East Midlands, where Heart is only available digitally, the station has an extra 15,000 listeners this quarter. Nationally, 7.5 million listeners tune in every week.

 

As a network, reach, share and total hours increased quarter on quarter with an increase of 315,000 listeners year on year, with 7.1 million listeners now tuning in every week.

 

LBC is almost hitting a million London listeners at 967,000. Up from 841,000 last quarter.

 

Choice FM now have 778,000 people listening every week, a rise in their total audience.

 

Classic FM is down very slightly, with 5.3 million listeners.