Is radio still popular in the UK

Yes. Despite decades of new technology competing for our attention, radio remains one of the most popular media in Britain. According to the latest RAJAR figures, 50.6 million adults, 87% of the UK population aged 15 and over, still tune in every single week.

Radio transmissions began late in the 19th century, so you would be forgiven for assuming such an old medium had faded. The listening data says otherwise. What has changed is not whether Britons listen to radio, but how they listen to it, and that shift is exactly where the opportunity lies for new stations.

Below we break down the most recent RAJAR results, what they reveal about modern listening habits, and why the numbers point squarely toward online radio.

What is RAJAR

RAJAR stands for Radio Joint Audience Research. It is the official body responsible for measuring radio audiences in the United Kingdom, and it is jointly owned by the BBC and Radiocentre, the industry body for UK commercial radio.

RAJAR collects its data through seven-day listening diaries completed by a representative panel of listeners. Each diary is placed in the household in paper or digital form, customised to the stations available in that area, and records every station the participant hears across the week. You can read more about the collection process here.

How popular is radio in the UK right now?

Very. According to the latest RAJAR release, covering the first quarter of 2026, 50.6 million adults (15 and over), or 87% of the adult population, tuned into radio each week. Together they listened to 1.007 billion hours over an average week, and the typical listener spent 19.9 hours with live radio.

Those headline numbers have eased only slightly from their recent peak, which tells you how resilient the medium is. What has genuinely changed is the platform mix. Terrestrial AM/FM now accounts for just 24% of weekly listening hours, with digital taking the other 76%. The full split looks like this:

Platform	Share of listening hours (%)
DAB	43.1
AM/FM (terrestrial)	24.0
Smart Speaker	18.8
Website/Apps	11.5
DTV	2.5

Digital's dominance is just as clear on reach: around 45 million adults, 76.5% of the population, now listen to radio on a digital platform every week. The independent regulator Ofcom reaches the same conclusion in its Media Nations report, confirming that digital listening has overtaken traditional broadcast.

Online radio has overtaken AM/FM

As an internet radio provider, we would be remiss not to highlight online radio's rise. Online listening (smart speaker plus website and apps) now makes up 30.4% of all UK radio hours. It still trails DAB at 43%, but the more striking milestone is that online has pulled clearly ahead of terrestrial AM/FM, 30.4% versus 24%.

That gap is widening fast. A year earlier, in Q1 2025, online was at 28.5% and terrestrial at 26.7%, almost neck and neck. Smart speakers are the engine behind this: they now drive 18.8% of all radio listening, up from 17.6% a year ago, and account for roughly 190 million weekly hours on their own. The direction of travel could hardly be clearer.

We are biased, of course, but if you are weighing up how to start a station, the data makes the case for you. Both DAB and terrestrial carry high barriers to entry and long lead times before you can broadcast at all. Sign up to RadioCult and you can be on air in a matter of minutes.

Radio still leads the whole audio diet

It is fashionable to claim that podcasts and streaming have killed radio. The data disagrees. Looking across every kind of audio, live radio, catch-up radio, music streaming, podcasts, owned music, and audiobooks, live radio still takes 66% of all listening hours, according to RAJAR's MIDAS Spring 2026 study. On-demand music streaming trails at 16%, and podcasts account for just 6%.

That said, the picture is not uniform across ages, and it pays to be honest about it. Listeners aged 15 to 34 now spend 58% of their audio time with streaming and podcasts, up from 40% in 2019 and nearly double the all-adult average, per Ofcom. Winning younger audiences is where the competition is fiercest, and it is exactly the space online-native stations are built to occupy.

One more shift worth noting for anyone entering the market: commercial radio has now overtaken the BBC on both reach and share, drawing 39.3 million weekly listeners (67%) and a 54.3% share of listening, against the BBC's 31.4 million (54%) and 43.4%. Independent broadcasting is not just surviving, it is setting the pace.

The verdict

The data does not lie: radio in all its forms is thriving across the United Kingdom. It has breadth, with 87% of the population tuning in weekly, and depth, with the average listener consuming nearly 20 hours a week. And with online radio taking an ever-larger share of that listening, there has never been an easier time to launch your own station.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is radio still popular in the UK in 2026?

Yes. RAJAR's Q1 2026 data shows 50.6 million adults, 87% of the population aged 15 and over, listen to radio every week, for an average of 19.9 hours each. Radio remains one of the most widely used media in the country.

Is online radio bigger than FM in the UK?

Online radio has overtaken terrestrial AM/FM by share of listening hours: 30.4% for online (smart speakers plus websites and apps) versus 24% for AM/FM in Q1 2026. DAB is still the single largest platform at around 43%.

Are young people still listening to radio?

Less than older listeners. Britons aged 15 to 34 now spend 58% of their audio time with streaming and podcasts rather than live radio. Radio still reaches young audiences, but engaging them is where online and on-demand formats matter most.

What is the difference between DAB and online radio?

DAB is digital radio broadcast over the airwaves and received on a DAB set. Online radio is streamed over the internet to phones, smart speakers, apps, and websites. Both are counted as digital, but only online radio lets you start broadcasting in minutes without any transmission infrastructure.