The BBC have found out that young people are moving away from their radio stations in favour of streaming services in Britain.

In their recently released ‘annual plan’ report, the BBC noted the drop in listener-ship for their popular radio stations which are staples of British broadcasting. The document, which lays out the BBC’s plans for the coming year and looks back at how their business went in the year just passed, dedicates a large portion to how consumption habits are changing.

They point out that whilst the majority of Brits still watch their TV programmes on broadcast though their iPlayer catch-up streaming website is bringing in more viewers all the time. For radio though it has become much more competitive, as the BBC say that “radio, streaming music services and podcasts are vying for time, attention and loyalty”.

Their research found that young people, aged 15-34, listened to streaming services more than all BBC radio stations combined. The report wrote: “For the first time, in October-December 2017 we estimate 15-34s listened more to streaming music services than all BBC Radio (5 hours vs. 4 hrs 30 mins a week)”

Music streaming has been growing massively in recent years and is quickly becoming the primary method of consumption for music listeners. As this starts to shift the music landscape for other formats, the BBC say: “We know that where children are leading the way, and where young audiences are now, older audiences will likely follow.”

BBC Radio is online and on mobiles to stream through iPlayer Radio as past shows but younger people especially seem to favour streaming services. The BBC plan to re-invent iPlayer Radio as they move forward with new approaches across all their businesses. The report wrote: “Later this year we will begin to transform what we know as BBC iPlayer Radio to provide a bolder and more intuitive mobile platform for our astonishing array of radio and audio content, including our growing range of podcast.”

How the BBC plan to go up against the giant music streaming industry wasn’t mentioned but it seems like they are going to try and create a hybrid somewhere between their existing radio platform and music streaming services.