Monocle 24 is a mainly speech-based internet radio station, broadcasting from Monocle's headquarters at Midori House in London. On weekdays, the station produces five hours of live, current affairs-based programmes. It also broadcasts weekly shows on business; culture; design; food and hospitality; print media and urbanism. The schedule is completed by regular music hours hosted by Monocle staff. Monocle 24 was launched in October 2011 and broadcasts in English, primarily from London, but with an international focus. It is a brand extension of Monocle Media Company, founded in 2007 by Canadian journalist and entrepreneur Tyler Brûlé, with a circulation of 73,000 per edition.^[1]

The first Monocle podcast appeared on 28 December 2008, 'The Monocle Weekly'^[2] hosted by Editor-in-Chief Tyler Brûlé, Editor Andrew Tuck and Culture Editor Robert Bound, covering topics such as politics, business and culture and featuring interviews with big names across several disciplines, and eventually hit download figures as high as 250,000 per month.^[3]

Monocle 24 officially launched on October 17, 2011 with four live shows on weekdays; The Globalist, The Briefing, Midori House and The Monocle Daily, as well as several extra shows over the weekend. Surrounding those shows were music hours known as The Continental Shift and The Atlantic Shift, as well as hour-long themed shows Culture with Robert Bound, Section D, The Entrepreneurs, The Urbanist and The Menu.^[4] The station was branded by bespoke music idents, including a number featuring the voice of pop star Kylie Minogue^[5] and the Quiet Nights Orchesta.

The station is influenced by the BBC World Service, as another global current affairs station with editorial programming on subjects all over the world. Tyler Brûlé said “From the point of view its ambitions for global reach and coverage of world affairs, Monocle 24 will probably resemble and sound like many commonwealth public service broadcasters, including BBC World Service, as well as shades of ABC and Canada’s CBC. We are hoping to create a station which follows the tradition of the great Commonwealth broadcasters. It’s no surprise that we have drawn a lot of great people from the BBC World Service.^[6]”

Changes to the schedule since its launch have included the introduction in August 2012 of The Stack, a 30-minute-long show on magazines and print media hosted by Tyler Brûlé on Saturday mornings. In April 2013, The Globalist was split into The Globalist and The Globalist Asia, with the latter focusing more on listeners in Asia, Australia and New Zealand.

Saturday and Sunday also feature the Weekend Edition, a mix of news, interviews, music and highlights.

Portions of Monocle 24 programmes are broadcast on ABC Radio National in Australia. Other Monocle 24 output is also broadcast by the CBC in Canada.

Monocle 24 also broadcasts from political, business and cultural events.

The station is live 24 hours a day at monocle.com/radio and also sees 2.5 million downloads per month of its programmes through its website and iTunes.

Between midnight and 5am London time, the station broadcasts ABC Radio news bulletins.

The station started broadcasting a new, news-based talk programme - "Aperitivo" - on 16 Sept 2013. The programme is trailed as having a "relaxed blend of conversation and analysis." The last edition was broadcast on 15 November 2013.

Many of the programmes are sponsored, by such companies as GE, Rolex, Lexus and Pictet. Previous sponsors include Kuoni, Krug, J. Crew and Blackberry

Some of the most frequently heard voices on Monocle 24 are those of magazine staff, such as Tyler Brûlé, Andrew Tuck, Robert Bound, Steve Bloomfield and Sophie Grove. However there are also regular radio staff, such as News Editor Tom Edwards, and producers Markus Hippi and Phil Han, whose voices can be heard across many shows. Freelance staff often appear on the station, such as Georgina Godwin, Nancy Durham, Emma Nelson, Dominic Reynolds, Andrew Mueller, Clemency Burton-Hill, Tadhg Enright, Poppy Trowbridge and Ted Kravitz. Jonathan Wheatley is one of the station's newsreaders.

There are also regular contributions from Monocle staff and guests at the organisation's bureaux in New York, Tokyo, Hong Kong, Zürich and Toronto.

51°31′11″N 0°09′17″W / 51.51977°N 0.15468°W / 51.51977; -0.15468