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Sasko Lazarov/Photocall Ireland
Listenership

The radio figures are out: we spend 4 hours a day tuned in but what are we listening to?

How’s Pat getting on at Newstalk? Is Ryan Tubridy winning his listeners back? And is everyone talking to Joe?

HAVE YOU NOTICED that whatever station you tune into this morning is telling you about how it’s the number one station in the country or the best in the county…or something else with a superlative?

Well it’s because the JNLR figures came out last night – the report looks at the listenership for all the stations in Ireland over the past 12 months.

It has A LOT of figures – which means nearly every show or station is best at something so they’re all competing to tell you what a success they are.

One thing is for sure though and that’s that we Irish just love our radio. From October 2013 to September 2014 – a massive 83% of us tuned in every weekday.

Around 58% of us listen to a local or regional station while 46% of us listen to a national station.

We spend around four hours per day tuned into these stations between 7am and 7pm during the week.

National radio is the most popular in Dublin and the wider commuter belt in the capital with 58% – while local and regional radio is in the majority for the rest of the country.

It’s particularly popular in the North West (64%), Cork (61%) and South West regions (60%).

Younger listeners (15-34 year olds) are the biggest fans of local and regional radio with 66% listening to local compared to 34% for nationals.

So here’s what you’re listening to:

Rise and Shine

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In the morning, the biggest show in town is still RTÉ’s Morning Ireland with 429,000 listeners everyday.

Newstalk Breakfast, hosted by Ivan Yates and Chris Donoghue, has 153,000 listeners daily – an increase in 32,000 listeners year on year.

Today FM’s Ian Dempsey is just shy of 200,000 listeners while 2FM’s ‘Breakfast Republic’ dropped 11,000 to 100,000 in the past 3 months.

Seán versus Pat

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RTÉ’s Today with Seán O’Rourke has 295,000 listeners – a drop of 12,000 since the last figures were released.

Meanwhile Pat Kenny continues to bring listeners to Newstalk with 143,000 people tuning into his show – an increase of 9,000 listeners book on book.

Put simply – Seán is still on top but his numbers are dropping while Pats are rising.

Mid-morning talk 

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Ray D’Arcy continues to dominate mid mornings on Today FM – with over 220,000 listeners tuning in to his 3 hour show.

While Ryan Tubridy has 171,000 tuning in to 2FM.

The drive home

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Drivetime on RTÉ Radio 1 remains the leading national evening programme in Ireland with 227,000 listeners. That’s a drop for Mary Wilson as the last report in July reported 242,000.

The Last Word with Matt Cooper on Today FM has 155,000 listeners a day – making it the second most listened to early-evening show in the county.

And finally…

It would be a disgrace to finish up without talking to Joe…or about Joe.

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The Liveline is open (sorry, habit) – Liveline is still ‘getting the nation talking’ with 382,000 listeners tuning into RTÉ 1 daily for the show.

And the Ronan Collins Show continues to be the biggest music programme in Ireland attracting 209,000 listeners.

If can check out the full report on the JNLR site.

Originally posted 20:30, 6 November

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