RAJAR results for Q1 ’11 made good news for the radio industry with all radio reach up to an all-time high, with 47.3m listeners each week and listening at its highest under the current methodology.

Nationally, the BBC has done fairly well gaining reach across all its main services with the exception of Five Live which has fallen back from a record high. Radio 2 maintains its position at the top of the pile, followed by its stable mates Radio 1 and 4. Commercially, the national stations have a respectable story to tell with Absolute and Classic making gains. talkSPORT is the success story here, celebrating record listening figures, with reach increasing an impressive 37% y-o-y. This comes on the back of a triumphant Monday night at the Sony radio awards where it won the accolade of Station of the Year for the first time.

It’s been all change in the highly competitive London market, where there’s a new number one. The newly renamed Capital London has regained the crown for the first time since 2005, with Heart taking 2^nd place (after a disappointing result last time around) and keeping Magic at 3^rd place. Capital also wins the breakfast race with Jonny Vaughan and Lisa Snowdon maintaining their place at the top.

Digital radio continues to put in a strong performance, posting increases in weekly reach, ownership, hours and share. 22.3 million listeners now tune in via a digital receiver each week, up from 19.7 million this time last year. Share of listening stands at 26.5% thanks to the jump in reach and hours – accounting for more than a quarter of all radio listening. Given that the government has stated that more than half of all radio listening must be via digital means before even considering switching off the analogue signal, it seems the UK still has a long way to go before that milestone is upon us.

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