BBC radio has declared its Q4 as “stable”, with 33.58 million listeners and a share of 51 per cent (from 49.4 per cent in last quarter and 33.97 per cent on the same period last year), according to data from Rajar.

Figures show that during the same three months, there was a record number of plays of on demand content on BBC Sounds, including radio programmes, podcasts and music mixes.

James Purnell, Director of BBC Radio and Education, said: “Our brilliant stations are much loved by our audiences and in this quarter we’ve seen some strong numbers for our speech stations, including a record for Radio 4 Extra. The latest figures show some of the challenges we face across the radio industry with retaining a live listening habit amongst young people, whose audio consumption is rapidly changing. We are focused on keeping live listening strong and looking for new ways to do so, but we also want to ensure we offer more for our audiences however they want to listen.

“During this quarter alone, we saw more than 100 million on demand plays of our content on BBC Sounds, double the previous quarter, demonstrating the increasing popularity of our radio programmes outside of our linear schedules,” he added.

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