{"id":875692,"date":"2026-09-01T02:16:16","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T02:16:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/875692\/"},"modified":"2026-09-01T02:16:16","modified_gmt":"2026-09-01T02:16:16","slug":"sydney-melbourne-radio-ratings-2gb-struggles-3aw-on-top-as-abc-melbourne-rises","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/875692\/","title":{"rendered":"Sydney Melbourne radio ratings: 2GB struggles, 3AW on top as ABC Melbourne rises"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Calum<\/p>\n

September 1, 2026 \u2014 10:08am<\/p>\n

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AAA<\/p>\n

Talkback station 2GB has lost further ground to Sydney\u2019s leading radio station, SmoothFM, but it\u2019s a different story in Melbourne, with 2GB\u2019s sister station, 3AW, continuing to dominate the airwaves.<\/p>\n

The differing fortunes of the two networks, bought by pokies and pubs baron Arthur Laundy and his family this year, have only widened since the business was sold earlier this year. Station 2GB slumped to an 11.2 per cent share in the fifth radio ratings, down 0.5 percentage points.<\/p>\n

\"BreakfastBreakfast show host Ben Fordham and 2GB owner Arthur Laundy: the station has lost more ground to SmoothFM in Sydney. <\/p>\n

The station is a distant second in Sydney to Lachlan Murdoch\u2019s SmoothFM which rose 0.1 percentage points to a 13.5 per cent share.<\/p>\n

Breakfast host at 2GB, Ben Fordham, continued to lead in the breakfast slot with a 14.8 per cent share, but Mornings host Mark Levy remains in second, behind Smooth\u2019s Ty Frost.<\/p>\n

The result marks the sixth straight survey since 2GB was the clear number one station in Sydney. The Laundy family purchased the suite of talkback stations<\/a> from Nine (the owner of this masthead) earlier this year for $56 million, creating the new radio business called Tapt Media.<\/p>\n

3AW remained the clear number-one station in Melbourne with a 14.1 per cent share, down 0.1 percentage points. Its breakfast show hosted by Russel Howcroft and Ross Stevenson again led the slot with a 19.5 per cent share despite, dropping 0.6 percentage points. Stations 2GB and 3AW traditionally benefit from their extensive coverage of the winter sports codes in their respective markets, the NRL and AFL.<\/p>\n

\"BreakfastBreakfast hosts at 3AW Russel Howcroft and Ross Stevenson remain on top in Melbourne.3AW<\/p>\n

There was little movement across both markets in the survey period which spanned May 24 to June 27 and then July 12 to August 15.<\/p>\n

Of the non-talkback commercial stations in Melbourne, GoldFM led once again with an 11.4 per cent share, up 0.6 percentage points. It is likely to be a welcome result for owners ARN Media, with KIIS FM languishing in both Melbourne and Sydney while the market waits for the company to appoint permanent breakfast hosts in the wake of the exits of Kyle Sandilands and Jackie \u201cO\u201d Henderson<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Speculation has continued to mount that KIIS will announce Dr Chris Brown as its new Sydney breakfast host. In Sydney, the station\u2019s breakfast show had a 6.9 per cent share while its Melbourne breakfast show had a 5.1 per cent share, the same figure as delivered by The Kyle and Jackie O Show earlier this year.<\/p>\n

Related Article\"Jackie<\/a><\/p>\n

The ABC\u2019s local stations in both Melbourne and Sydney had minor gains. In Sydney, the station grew from 5.3 to 5.5 per cent overall, while in Melbourne, the station grew 0.5 percentage points to a 6 per cent share. Both breakfast shows also had positive results, with Craig Reucassel\u2019s show up 0.7 percentage points to a 7.8 per cent share, while the Melbourne show hosted by Bob Murphy and Richelle Hunt grew 1.3 percentage points to a 6.6 per cent share.<\/p>\n

The Business Briefing newsletter delivers major stories, exclusive coverage and expert opinion. Sign up to get it every weekday morning<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\"CalumCalum Jaspan<\/a> is a media writer for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age, based in Melbourne. Reach him securely on Signal @calumjaspan.10Connect via X<\/a> or email<\/a>.From our partners<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"September 1, 2026 \u2014 10:08am Save You have reached your maximum number of saved items. Remove items from…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":875693,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[64,63,134,136],"class_list":["post-875692","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-entertainment","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875692","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=875692"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/875692\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/875693"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=875692"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=875692"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=875692"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}