Internet radio listening is booming

6th September 2008

Radio audience measurement body RAJAR has published its second survey into Internet radio and podcast listening, and despite the BBC still refusing to promote Internet radio on its TV adverts for digital radio -- whereas the BBC showed its 20^th TV advertising campaign for DAB in the run-up to Christmas last year -- 2.5 million more people are now listening to radio via the Internet than did so in October to November last year, when RAJAR carried out its first survey of Internet radio listening.

The following figure shows how the percentage of adults who listen to Internet radio each week has changed over time:

Type of listening	No. of listeners Oct - Nov 2007 millions	No. of listeners Apr - May 2008 millions	Percentage change
Listen to radio via the Internet	12	14.5	+21%
Listen to live Internet radio	9	10.9	+21%
Listen to Listen Again streams	7.6	9.3	+22%
Have downloaded a podcast	4.3	6	+40%
Listen to personalised radio stations (e.g. last.fm)	1.6	2.1	+31%
Listen to Internet radio at least once per week	8.1	9.4	+16%

Some other points from the survey are as follows:

89% of Internet radio listeners listen at home and 24% listen at work
Three quarters of Listen Again users say it has no impact on the amount of live radio they listen to
Half of Listen Again users say they're listening to programmes that they didn't previously listen to as a result of the Listen Again service
Typical podcast user subscribes to 3.59 podcasts
Comedy and music are the favourite podcast genres
Three quarters of podcast users subscribe to podcasts on iTunes and 20% download podcasts directly from websites
79% listen to podcasts on their home computer, 66% listen on an MP3 player/mobile phone
29% of UK adults have listened to Internet radio
2.5m people listen to Internet radio every day or most days
31% of people surveyed said they were aware of personalised Internet radio stations such as last.fm
57% of people surveyed said they used Windows Media Player to organise their audio on their home computer, 51% iTunes and 39% Real Player
1.9m have downloaded a video podcast
67% of all podcast users listen to BBC podcasts but just 4% listen to podcasts from commercial radio stations
79% of podcast users listen to podcasts at home, 25% listen in the car, 25% listen on public transport, 21% while walking and 19% while at the workplace
Podcast listening peaks in the evening, whereas ordinary radio listening happens mostly in the daytime

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