Overall radio listenership declined slightly in 2022, but Bauer Media Audio Ireland and Wireless Ireland stations made gains at the expense of RTÉ, according to the latest JNLR/Ipsos MRBI report.

Some 3.2m or 78.3% of all adults listen the the radio every weekday, and 90.7% of the population listens every week, the survey shows. A total of c.16,800 people were interviewed by Ipsos for the study.

The proportion tuning into local or regional stations (51.6%) and national stations (42.6%) each declined 0.1% during the latest survey period, while listenership among the 15-34 age bracket rose 0.2% to 68.1%.

Irish audiences now listen to almost four hours, or 237 minutes of radio on average between 7am and 7pm per day, a decline of two minutes from the previous survey.

Local/regional radio took a 54.9% share, compared to 45.1% for national stations, a 0.3% swing in favour of local/regional broadcasters from the last reporting period.

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In Dublin and the commuter belt, national radio (56.6%) holds the majority share, with local/regional on top elsewhere, and particularly in Cork (65%), the north-west (60.8%), and the south-west (58.1%).

RTÉ Radio 1 remains the only station with more than 1m listeners at 1.34m, and it holds 17 of the top 20 radio programmes despite seeing its audience share drop 0.7% to 20.5% last year.

"There appears to be a continuation of post-Covid adjustment in this book, but there is also encouragement in our reach to 20–45-year-olds being up across the board," said Peter Woods, head of RTÉ Radio 1. 

"This growth in younger cohorts is positive as we are here to build a station that reaches across generations and is future-proofed."

Morning Ireland was the most listened programme (433,000), ahead of Playback (347,000), The Brendan O'Connor Show (338,000), The Business (336,000), and The Ryan Tubridy Show (331,000).

Today with Claire Byrne (321k), Sunday with Miriam (317k), the News at One (310k), Liveline (310k) and Sunday Miscellany (301k) completed the top 10. Today FM's Dermot and Dave (207k), Ian Dempsey Breakfast Show (203k), and Newstalk's Pat Kenny Show (174k) were the only non-RTÉ programmes in the top 20.

While daily listenership for RTÉ stations was down -0.5%, listenership at Bauer-owned Today FM (+0.3%) and Newstalk (+0.1%) increased marginally, while Wireless Ireland's FM104 (+0.7%), Cork's 96fm (+0.4%) also made gains.

Today FM now boasts weekly listenership of 875,000 (9.6% share) and Newstalk has 792,000 weekly listeners (7.2%), with managing editor Patricia Monahan of Newstalk describing the station as "advancing its position as the talk station for a new generation."

Newstalk Breakfast has added 14,000 listeners year-on-year, taking its total to 152,000; Moncrieff now has an audience of 96,000 (+19,000), and The Hard Shoulder has 159,000 (+8,000).

Wireless Ireland, the Rupert Murdoch-owned group that also operates Dublin's Q102, Live95 in Limerick and LMFM, said it now has a weekly audience of 759,000, and its audience share has risen 0.7% year-on-year to 11.9%.

Cork's 96m (20.9%) and Live95 (27%) retained their leading positions in their respective markets. Wireless Ireland has a 37.8% share in Cork between 96m and C103, while FM104 and Q102 have helped the group to an 11% share in Dublin.

“I’m delighted to see our audience continue to grow, delivering market leading brands in Ireland’s most premium markets and with the changes recently implemented in Dublin, we expect to see further growth in the future as shows like 104 Drive with Graham and Nathan deliver more traction," said Sean Barry, managing director of Wireless Ireland.

"It’s particularly pleasing to see the continued progress made in Cork as Cork's 96fm reclaims a market leading position and KC and Ross establish themselves as the number one breakfast show in the market.

"The strong performance of our FM stations alongside exciting digital assets like talkSPORT Ireland, which brings the Premier League Live to Ireland every Saturday, leaves the business in a strong position to take advantage of the continued market demand for audio."

(Pic: Getty Images)