Population:	60.6 million
Coverage:	85%
Services:	21 DAB
Sales (accumulated):	14,000,000 devices
Penetration by household:	40%

Last update: 30-01-2012

The Government-Industry Digital Radio Action Plan, published in July 2010, sets out a detailed timetable and tasks to build momentum and prepare for the switchover to digital radio. Switchover will be consumer-led and specific criteria will have to be met before Government decides when it will take place.

The Digital Economy Act 2010 gave the Secretary of State the flexibility to set a date for digital radio switchover.

Before a date can be set, two criteria need to be met:

 - 50% of listening must be to digital platforms.

- Digital coverage for national services must be comparable to FM and local DAB reaches 90% of the population and major roads. 

The Act also says that, in deciding whether or not to set a date, the Secretary of State must consider information supplied by Ofcom and the BBC; consultation must be held with radio licence holders, listeners’ representatives and others. Everyone who has a stake in UK radio: listeners, the BBC, commercial operators and the regulator will have an input into when switchover takes place. 

Digital listening hours for Q3, 2011 reached 304 million hours, up 16%, from 262 million hours in Q3, 2010.   DAB radio maintains its position as the most popular device when it comes to listening to digital radio, accounting for 63.9% of all digital hours. 

Access to a DAB receiver is up 12% on Q3, 2010 with almost two in five of the population (39.4%), or 20.5 million adults (aged 15+) claiming to live in a household which has a DAB set (c.f. 18.3 million in Q3, 2010).

Please see here for an interactive map of UK DAB coverage - http://maps.ofcom.org.uk/dab/index.html 

Local DAB multiplexes are estimated to cover 66.2% of households.

The BBC have built over 80 new DAB transmitters taking national coverage to 93% of the UK population. The BBC’s Tim Davie has confirmed the BBC will build out to 97% coverage of its national services by a target date of 2015. The third new major transmitter around London, Epping Green, will shortly launch. Together the three improve coverage for over 9 million people and add around a quarter of a million new households into coverage for the first time.

An agreement on funding for local DAB coverage is expected to be reached this quarter. 

Northern Ireland - please see here for an up to date summary of coverage in N.I. - http://stakeholders.ofcom.org.uk/binaries/research/cmr/cmr11/NI_Doc_Section_3.pdf

In this country there are

• National multiplexes: 2 Regular
• Regional multiplexes: 10 Regular
• Local multiplexes: 38 Regular

The BBC have announced the launch of BBC Olympics Extra, broadcast during the Olympic Games this summer

There are hundreds of DAB products on the market in the UK being sold through a large number of high street and online retailers as well as most of the big electrical chains. The cheapest receivers are sold at no more than GBP20.

A Royal Charter and Agreement govern the public broadcaster; the BBC, with new stations subject to Government approval and the Office of Communications (Ofcom) regulate the commercial sector. Multiplex licences are currently awarded on a beauty contest formula rather than auctioned. Regulation controls such things as minimum bit-rate for music stations, mandatory must carry’ obligations, maintenance of service providers stations commitments and the amount of data content.

The UK Government published its final Digital Britain report on 16th June. This follows on from the government’s Digital Radio Working Group report which published its own recommendations for the digital future of radio in the UK. The Digital Radio Working Group suggested that these criteria could be met between 2015 and 2020 and therefore a switchover could occur as early as 2017.

The Digital Britain Report set out a five point plan for DAB to be in all new cars by 2013 is proposed and the report called on the European Commission to lead a common Europe-wide approach to digital radio. The Digital Britain report by Lord Carter, the British Minister for Communications, is the culmination of work by the Department of Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS) and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (DIS).The report can be found in full at http://www.culture.gov.uk/images/publications/digitalbritain-finalreport-jun09.pdf

Details of the Digital Economy Act which sets out details of plans for migration of analogue to digital radio can be found at http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2010/ukpga_20100024_en_1