However, the network did suffer a fall in overall listenership dropping 12.4% on the quarter.

BBC: Record ratings for digital radio stations

However, 5 live itself saw listenership slip during the three-month period, by 38, 000.

BBC: Record ratings for digital radio stations

The latest is the new batch of ratings figures from Arbitron, which show listenership plummeting for some of the biggest names in radio.

FORBES: Right Wing Media Gets Right-Sized

But note that the audience for public radio is up 57% over the past decade, while radio overall has seen listenership hours decline 13% since 1993.

FORBES: Prairie Home Commercial

Partly thanks to the proliferation of independent radio stations, combined with the extra time spent sitting in traffic jams, radio listenership has risen by a quarter in the past five years.

ECONOMIST: The newspaper industry

Now we know our audience isn't as big as the World Cup's, but we have a nice audience and we appreciate every one of you, and you'll be happy to know we have just figured out a way to increase our listenership by a factor of, oh, 100 trillion, without adding anybody new.

NPR: Bacteria Outnumber Cells in Human Body