Zoe Ball departed her Radio 2 breakfast show with her biggest audience in almost two years

Ball, 54, who had been at the helm of the how since 2019, left the programme in December telling listeners it had been a ‘gift’ to do the show.

The latest listening figures from research body Rajar reveal that for the final quarter of 2024 her audience grew to 6.8 million. 

This was up by nine per cent, or nearly 550,000 from the previous three months.

Her show was also up by more than 250,000 on the same period last year.

Ball has gone through some difficult times with radio audience figures. 

In summer 2019 it emerged she had lost 800,000 listeners and been overtaken by then stablemate Ken Bruce.

The presenter was off air during part of the summer last year, with a brief return on August 8, before her full-time return near the end of September.

The programme is still the most popular breakfast radio show in the UK. Her replacement Scott Mills started in the role at the end of last month.

Ball’s performance helped Radio 2 post improved listening figures for the quarter, attracting on average 13.6 million listeners a week in the three months to December.

This was up from 13.3 million from the same period a year earlier.

The BBC said Vernon Kay’s mid-morning show was ‘the biggest in the country’, with a ‘growing audience’ of 7.2m.

But there was less good news for Radio 4, which lost more than half a million listeners in the past three months, according to the figures.

The station was down by 647,000 listeners across the week from the previous quarter, dropping to about 9.0 million from 9.7m.

Its flagship news show the Today programme lost about 112,000 on the quarter, down to 5.7m from 5.8m. 

But it was up from 5.6m a year earlier.

BBC Radio 2 head Helen Thomas said: ‘Zoe Ball continued to host the UK’s most listened to breakfast show, and Vernon Kay celebrates fantastic figures which continue to grow.’

A BBC spokesman said: ‘Radio 4 remains the biggest speech radio station by far with 9 million listeners despite an overall declining speech market. As is the case with TV, audience habits have shifted to on-demand over recent years with 13 million adults now listening to podcasts weekly. Radio 4 is perfectly placed to offer listeners a brilliant live schedule complemented by the very best podcasts and on-demand radio programmes.’