Another record low for Classic FM as BBC Radio 3 bounces back
Classic FM’s audience is its lowest on record, according to new figures from RAJAR (Radio Join Audience Research). Released today, the figures cover the third quarter of 2024. Launched in 1992, the RAJAR website lists quarterly listening figures on their website from 1999.
Classic FM has lost 37,000 listeners from June 2024, falling 0.8% to 4.42 million. This is Classic FM’s lowest audience since RAJAR figures began.
There is now an overall trend of decline for Classic FM, having posted record lows for 9 of the last 13 quarters, including dropping under 5 million listeners for the first time. Classic FM has lost over 1 million listeners from its pre-pandemic audience of 5.48 million in March 2020, a drop of 19.5%.
(RAJAR did not report quarterly figures between March 2020 and September 2021 due to the pandemic).
BBC Radio 3 has gained 206,000 listeners since June 2024, rising 11.2% to 2.04 million.
BBC Radio 3’s audience has historically fluctuated between 1.7 million and 2.1 million. This quarter sees BBC Radio 3’s audience rise 59,000 since the start of the pandemic, an increase of3.0%.
Before the pandemic, the gap between Classic FM and BBC Radio was 3.5 million listeners, but has now closed by 1.13 million to 2.38 million, a reduction of 32.2%. This is due to the significant decline in Classic FM’s audience.
Magic Classical (formerly known as Scala Radio) grew 23,000 listeners, from 196,000 to 219,000, an increase of 11.7%. However, it has lost nearly a third of its audience from before the pandemic, dropping 29.4% from 310,000 before the pandemic.
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