Nine Radio wins back Melbourne … and is the city warming to Kyle?

Nine’s two biggest talkback stations — Sydney’s 2GB and Melbourne’s 3AW — were both knocked off the top of the ratings last survey by Nova’s Smooth and ARN’s Gold, respectively. This time, 3AW has managed to claw back to the top of the heap, while 2GB has slipped further.

Last ratings book, 3AW lost its rusted-on crown in an extremely tight Melbourne radio market that meant a modest 0.6% audience fall was enough for it to lose the lead to Gold 104.3 — albeit by 0.2%.

It was the first time since 1992 that Gold had topped the overall Melbourne ratings — and 3AW simply wasn’t going to let that stand, jumping by 1.6 points to claim 13.5% of the city’s listeners. To further the defeat, Gold dropped by 0.9% to land at 11.2%.

Not that Gold’s Melbourne breakfast champ Christian O’Connell didn’t try his darndest, pushing Nova’s Jase and Lauren off the FM breakfast podium the pair occupied for most of 2024.

Although O’Connell’s percentage share didn’t shift this survey, Jase and Lauren fell by 0.8%, slipping 0.1% behind Gold. That’s on the FM band – over on AM, 3AW’s breakfast team Ross Stevenson and Russel Howcroft have taken a huge 2.4% leap to sit at 19% – some 8.9% ahead of O’Connell.

And what’s this? Kyle and Jackie O on ARN’s KIIS have gained half a point to climb to 6.1% of the Melbourne breakfast market. They’ve moved past ABC Melbourne Breakfast — whose Sharnelle Vella and Bob Murphy fell 1.3% — and now sit at 7th overall, and 6th in FM. This is the pair’s best Melbourne result to date, after sitting stagnant around the 5% mark since launching in April 2024.

The symbolism of Kyle Sandilands moving past ABC Melbourne’s self-described “irreverent musings” in a list of the city’s breakfast radio preferences should not be underestimated.

Melbourne’s radio ratings. GFK. (Click to enlarge)

In Sydney, Smooth dropped 0.5%, but remained the city’s top radio station, with 11.8% of listenership.

2GB continues to lose audience, dropping a further 0.2% to sit at 11.4%, with Ben Fordham losing half a percentage point in breakfast, and Mark Levy’s woes continuing in the Mornings slot.

Levy has lost a further 1.5% to sit at 11.5% — well below Smooth’s Ty Frost, who pulled 13.8% of the timeslot audience. Given that Ray Hadley held the #1 position in 2GB Mornings for twenty straight years, there’s a lot of pressure on Levy and 2GB to arrest this slide.

Meanwhile, after being blamed by ARN’s CEO for the financial woes of its parent company during its recent yearly earnings call, KIIS has gained 0.7% to sit at 11.1% – well within striking distance of Nine’s 2GB.

KIIS also rose in the Melbourne market, and with even Kyle climbing there, maybe they should pump the brakes and stop “actively working on shifting its operating model [and] refreshing our content for commercial results” — as they recently promised investors.

Sydney’s radio rating. GFK. (Click to enlarge)

Kyle and Jackie O have also reclaimed the overall Sydney breakfast crown from 2GB’s Ben Fordham (the pair have won FM for 53 straight surveys – and counting), climbing 1.4% to take 15.3% for KIIS, compared to 2GB’s 14.2%.

The closest FM competitors to Sandilands and Henderson are Jonesy and Amanda over on sister station GOLD101.7 — who have 8.2% of the audience, and will move to Drive in 2026 — and Smooth with Bogart Torelli, on 8.1%.

Finally, a few surveys on from 2DayFM’s format shift in March — which saw the station skew younger in demographic — and the station has lost percentage share overall, dropping from 4.3% to 4.1% and slipping behind Triple J.

However, 2DayFM has picked up 3.5% of the listening audience in the 10-17 age-range (Triple J lost 1.6%), and won over a further 0.9% in 18s-24s, so the format shift is working for them in that way.

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