Smart Speaker listening trends in the UK – RAJAR Report Q2 2026

Radio listening on smart speakers has consistently risen by double digits YoY for the past 5 years and shows no sign of slowing down.

Smart speakers have become a mainstream UK radio platform. More than one in five commercial radio hours are now delivered through smart speakers. Weekly smart speaker radio consumption has almost doubled since RAJAR began separately reporting the platform in 2022.

The commercial implication is stronger than simply “smart-speaker penetration is growing”. RAJAR evidence shows that there is already a very large pool of radio advertising impressions being delivered through devices that have a microphone, identity layer, internet connection and the potential to turn an audio impression into an interaction.

Smart speakers are no longer a niche way to listen to the radio. They are becoming a significant part of the UK audio landscape, and the latest RAJAR figures make that shift increasingly difficult for advertisers to ignore.

In Q1 2022, UK radio listening via smart speakers accounted for 101 million hours each week. By Q2 2026, that had risen to 195 million hours, an increase of 94 million hours and growth of 93%.

Nearly one in five UK radio listening hours now takes place through a smart speaker.

The audience has grown too. Weekly reach has increased from 15.7% to 27.5% of the UK population, while smart speakers now account for 18.7% of all UK radio listening, up from 9.9% in 2022. For commercial radio specifically, the figure is even higher, with 22.1% of listening now taking place through smart speakers.

For advertisers, this matters because a smart speaker impression is fundamentally different from one delivered through a traditional radio.

It is being delivered through a connected, voice-enabled device, usually in the home, where the listener has the ability to respond immediately.

Yet most smart speaker impressions are still bought, priced and measured in exactly the same way as the rest of an audio campaig which feels like a missed opportunity.

With the right creative and technology, an audio advertisement can invite a listener to respond by voice, request more information, receive a link, set a reminder, enter a competition or continue into a branded conversation.

It turns audio from something people simply hear into something they can act upon and as smart speakers take a larger share of radio listening, the question for advertisers is no longer whether the audience is there, its whether we should continue treating these increasingly valuable impressions as passive audio.

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