Alan Jones gets biggest audience jump since virus struck

While the 2GB star added listeners, ABC Sydney’s breakfast program with Wendy Harmer and Robbie Buck were the big losers.

Alan Jones was Sydney radio’s big breakfast winner in the time of coronavirus. Picture: John Feder

2GB’s breakfast radio star Alan Jones has recorded the biggest audience jump in Sydney during the coronavirus crisis, extending his grip on the nation’s biggest radio market.

Jones’s breakfast audience share jumped 3.1 per cent points to 17.9 per cent in the harbour city.

In stark contrast, ABC Sydney’s radio breakfast program, hosted by Wendy Harmer and Robbie Buck, were the big losers, with their audience share down 0.9 points to 10.9 per cent.

Fellow 2GB radio host Ray Hadley, who rules the 9am to 12pm Sydney radio audience, saw his audience share rise 1.3 points to 18.8 per cent, according to GfK’s second radio ratings survey of the year.

In Australia’s second biggest radio market, Melbourne, Ross Stevenson and John Burns’s breakfast show on 3AW also picked up listeners, up 1.4 points to 17.3 per cent. In the previous survey, their audience share dropped 4.3 points, which was the biggest fall during the breakfast listening period across AM and FM in Melbourne.

Neil Mitchell, who hosts 3AW’s morning show for Nine Radio, saw his audience share rise 0.3 points to 15.5 per cent, after falling 1.6 points in the previous survey.

ABC Melbourne’s radio morning host Virginia Trioli has recorded her first rise in audience share since taking over from long-standing host Jon Faine mid-October, up 1.5 points to 12.7 per cent.

The rise in radio listeners during COVID-19 comes as audience numbers soar across Australian news sites and commercial television news programs.

The Australian has more than doubled its online audience to 4.9 million, as the public seeks out the latest news and analysis on the coronavirus crisis, making it the No 1 subscriber-only news site in the nation.

The masthead’s digital audience surged by 110 per cent over the 12 months to March, and by 101 per cent month-on-month as readers sought the latest on the health crisis and economic fallout, according to the latest figures from data and analytics group Nielsen.

GfK’s second radio survey will be the last for a couple of months, with Commercial Radio Australia announcing on April 3 that the next three surveys will be put on hold due to the government restrictions related to COVID-19.