June 11, 2026 — 12:11pmIf management at ARN is looking for vindication of its national syndication strategy, the third radio ratings survey of the year, covering March 1 to May 23 (excluding the two weeks of Easter school holidays), offers mixed results.On the one hand, the costs of the Kyle and Jackie O debacle are starting to register in the listener numbers as well as in the legal bills, with KIIS1065’s share of the breakfast market – where the pair had been dominant for much of the past two decades – dropped precipitously from 11.7 per cent of the total radio audience to 8.2. The average audience decline in the first full survey without the pair on air was even starker: down one-third from 93,000 listeners to 62,000.In happier times: Kyle Sandilands and Jackie “O” Henderson.FacebookYear-on-year, the numbers arguably look even worse: in survey three of 2025, the pair – who are separately suing ARN for wrongful dismissal following the termination of their 10-year, $100 million -per-person contract with almost eight years left to run – enjoyed a 12.5 per cent share of the Sydney market. The 4.2 point drop year-on-year represents a 34.4 per cent decline in market share.On the other hand, ARN’s syndication strategy is starting to turn into gold over on Gold, where Christian O’Connell’s Breakfast show added a quarter in average audience numbers (up from 44,000 to 55,000) and 1.7 points in share, up from 5.5 to 7.2 per cent. While O’Connell was down slightly in his home market of Melbourne – from a 10.5 per cent share to 10 per cent – Gold’s owners will take the win.In the first survey since Nine (owner of this masthead) got out of the radio business, its former station 2GB, now owned by Tapt Media, took a hit, dropping from 13.3 per cent share to 11.8. Nonetheless, that still left it in second place behind SmoothFM, which recorded a 13.1 per cent share (down from 13.3).Smooth remains one of the great audio success stories. Of the 4.679 million cumulative listeners in the Sydney radio market – those who tuned in for at least eight minutes at some point over the survey period – almost one in three (1.448 million) tuned into the contemporary easy-listening station.Christian O’Connell is starting to build audience share in Sydney.Eddie JimThe reliance on classic playlists isn’t a guaranteed winner, though. On the FM band, adult contemporary station 2Day is down slightly to a 4.3 per cent share (from 4.7), but over on AM, 2UE – once the arch-rival of 2GB in the talkback space – is finding success as a purveyor of 1970s and ’80s hits, climbing from a 2.7 per cent share in the last survey to 4.2.Meanwhile, the ABC’s struggles in the Sydney radio market continue, despite a small lift in audience share.Across the week, the station recorded a 4.6 per cent share, up from 4.3 per cent in the last survey. But that result was its worst ever in the modern ratings era, having dropped from 5.1 per cent share in the first survey of the year.For the optimistic, there are green shoots of recovery to be spotted in lifts across all slots of the day, while cumulative audience is up too, by 50,000 listeners (those who tuned in for at least eight minutes at some point over the survey period) to 518,000. But surely the greater concern is the average audience number: this time last year, 27,000 people were tuned into ABC Radio Sydney at any point across the day. That number is now 21,000, unchanged from last survey.Start the day with a summary of the day’s most important and interesting stories, analysis and insights. Sign up for our Morning Edition newsletter.From our partners