Moyles catching up with Sir Terry

Version 0 of 1.

BBC Radio 1 presenter Chris Moyles has almost as many listeners as rival breakfast host Sir Terry Wogan, new figures have revealed.

Moyles notched up an audience of 7.7m people, compared with 7.78m for the veteran Radio 2 host.

In the first three months of 2009, Sir Terry's audience slipped from 7.9m, while Moyles increased from 7.3m.

Radio industry body Rajar also says that listening is at a higher level than any time in the past 10 years.

Most popular station

Almost 46m people - more than 90% of all UK adults - tuned in each week in the first quarter of this year.

A third listened via digital radio, the internet or digital television, and the number using mobile phones rose 13%.

BBC Radio 4 and BBC Radio 5 Live both saw audiences grow, while BBC Radio 2 remained the UK's most popular station.

This is radio's highest audience since new recording methods were introduced 10 years ago by Rajar (Radio Joint Audience Research).

BBC Radio 4 drew its largest audience since 2003 - 9.98m - in the first quarter of this year.

BBC Radio 5 Live, along with its digital sister service 5 Live Sports Extra, pulled in 6.3m - its biggest audience for four years.

Commercial radio's audience also grew from 31.2m to 31.5m listeners a week, while BBC Radio 2 held onto the overall top spot with 13.46m listeners.

Last month, the BBC denied a report that Moyles was being removed from the breakfast slot in a reshuffle later this year.

It pointed to the last set of Rajar figures, saying he had "added more listeners" and "has a hugely successful show".