RTÉ's Radio 1 remains most popular station ahead of shakeup next week

RTÉ Radio 1 has reached 1,376,000 listeners weekly, according to the latest survey by Joint National Listenership Research (JNLR).

The station is the first choice for 35-54-year-olds. Morning Ireland remains Ireland’s most-listened-to radio programme with 471,000 listeners. Sunday Miscellany has 318,000 listeners, an increase of 47,000, while Sunday with Miriam has 337,000 listeners, an increase of 37,000.

Brendan O’Connor on Saturday has 419,000 listeners (+77,000 YoY), with 427,000 listeners tuning in on Sunday.

Tara Campbell, Head of RTÉ Radio 1, said: “As Radio 1 embarks on an exciting new chapter with our new schedule starting on Monday, it's great to see that we're building from a position of strength."

The shakeup to RTÉ's scheduling will come into effect next Monday, November 10th.

Last month, Newstalk’s Kieran Cuddihy became Liveline presenter from next Monday, replacing Joe Duffy. Ray D’Arcy also departed from RTÉ after 11 years.

The JNLR figures show that Liveline listenership has dropped by 20,000 to 279,000, while the Ray D'Arcy show dropped by 1,000 to 181,000.

RTÉ 2FM attracted 653,000 weekly listeners and increased its share to 10.4 per cent among 15–34 year-olds, but suffered a loss of 24,000 listeners since the last survey.

Overall, the number of people listening to the radio every weekday has reached almost 3.5 million, an increase of 79 per cent.

3,481,000 people now listen to the radio every weekday, growing by 59,000 from the previous year. This is the equivalent of the entire adult population tuning into a radio station every weekday.

The figures also showed that Today FM continues to be Ireland’s most listened to commercial radio station, with a weekly audience of 930,000 listeners. Its daily listenership also exceeded the half-million mark to 503,000, and its market share increased to 8.8 per cent. These figures follow Today FM's award as National Station of the Year at the recent IMRO Radio Awards.

Managing Editor for Today FM, Nathan Murphy, said: "Our increase in listenership across the schedule reflects the connection and trust we’ve built with our audience and is something the entire team can be very proud of.”

The Ian Dempsey Breakfast Show was the most listened to show on commercial radio, with an audience figure of 218,000 listeners (+5,000 book-on-book (BoB), as compared with the previous survey period.)

Dave Moore on Today FM also increased his audience to 204,000 listeners (+6,000 BoB).

Gaeilgeoir Louise Cantillon saw the largest jump in listenership, with an audience of 129,000 (+10,000 BoB).

Ray Foley now has an audience of 156,000.

The Last Word with Matt Cooper increased its audience to 184,000, (+3,000 BoB and +17,000 YoY (year on year)). Mr Cooper also released a new podcast, Think You Know... The Presidents, exploring the colourful history of Irish presidents.