Times Radio overtook both GB News Radio and fellow News UK station Talk (formerly Talkradio) for weekly reach in the final quarter of 2024, according to RAJAR listening figures.
Times Radio was listened to for at least five minutes by an average of 604,000 people a week, beating out Talk (504,000) and GB News’ radio simulcast station (468,000).
Times Radio saw 8% growth in its reach compared with the third quarter and 23% growth compared with Q4 the year before, making it one of the UK’s fastest-growing speech stations.
Only the BBC World Service (1.2 million) saw the same quarterly growth in Q4. LBC News (UK) (974,000) saw slightly less year-on-year growth of 20%.
Times Radio’s rise up the charts was facilitated by quarterly drops of 23% and 13% at GB News Radio and Talk respectively. It comes after GB News Radio recorded bumper quarterly reach growth of 18% in Q3.
Talk saw the biggest year-on-year drop in our analysis of speech stations, down 31% compared to Q4 2023. GB News Radio did grow year on year by 9%.
Despite their audience drops, Talk and GB News Radio saw the biggest gains in average hours per listener, up 18% to 10.3 hours and 16% to 7.4 hours respectively.
The largest drop in average hours per listener came at the UK-wide LBC News, where listeners spent 12% less time (2.2 hours) with the station.
Scott Taunton, the executive vice president and president of broadcasting at News UK, said the Times Radio and Talk owner "continues to set the pace for digital audience growth".
“As audio and video platforms continue to converge, News Broadcasting has continued its fast growth in visualised form, achieving 764 million global video views across Facebook, Youtube and Tiktok during the quarter.
"Talksport's recent launch onto smart TV, in partnership with LG Channels, Samsung TV Plus, FireTV, Apple TV and Google TV, is further demonstration of our innovation and ambition on behalf of our audiences and commercial partners.”
BBC Radio 2, still the station with the highest reach (13.6 million) in Press Gazette's analysis, saw both year-on-year and quarterly growth of 3%, while average hours per listener also grew 3% compared with last quarter to 10.8 million.
BBC Local and Regional radio (7.2 million reach) saw 6% growth compared with Q3, leading it to overtake Radio 5 Live (5.3 million) after that station saw an 11% decline.
Radio 4 (nine million, down 7% quarter-on-quarter and 1% year-on-year) remains the station on the chart with the highest average hours per listener, at 12.3.
Charlotte Moore, the BBC's chief content officer, said: “The radio sector in the UK is going though rapid change with an explosion of new stations, and I’m delighted that Radio 2 and Radio 6 Music with their incredible presenters, expert music teams and unrivalled live content are proving so popular with audiences.
“We know that people’s listening habits and expectations are shifting to suit their moods and interests. More so than ever, it’s paramount that we continue to innovate and give licence fee payers more choice from the BBC across our distinctive music extensions, on demand radio and world class podcasts.”
The BBC also disclosed that on its Sounds podcast app the feed it launched spotlighting investigative content from Tortoise Media "ranked in the top ten podcasts among under 35s, demonstrating the success of BBC Sounds’ acquisition partnerships".
In the breakfast slot six of the three stations in Press Gazette's analysis saw their reach drop between Q3 and Q4. GB News Radio's breakfast show shed 23.3% of its weekly reach (194,000), representing a 6.7% year-on-year fall. Times Radio, meanwhile, saw the largest gain of 12.7% compared with Q3 2024 and 6.2% compared with Q4 2023.
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