Sara Cox will launch her new Radio 2 Breakfast show on 6 July, and Tom Hanks will open the first broadcast as her first guest. The 6.30am start gives Radio 2 a new face at the top of its schedule, with a launch built around a Hollywood name rather than a soft reset.
6 July at 6.30am
The new programme begins at 6.30am, and Cox said on Vernon Kay’s Radio 2 show on 15 June that she was “very very excited”. She also told listeners: “But I can now announce, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, and everyone in between, please do join me for my very first Breakfast Show on Radio 2 on 6th of July. Three weeks today! Very very excited. It is 6.30am. The date is the 6th of July.”
That timing matters because breakfast radio is built on routine, and a first show at 6.30am leaves no room for a slow rollout. Cox has already signalled the shape of the move: a fresh new format, but with listeners’ favourite bits from her former show still in the mix.
Tom Hanks opens the line-up
Tom Hanks will be the first guest, and he will talk about Toy Story 5. Radio 2 has also said the new show will include chats with some of the world’s biggest stars, so the launch guest is doing more than providing a big-name talking point; he is setting the tone for the kind of booking strategy the programme wants to use from day one.
For Cox, that is the practical way to signal continuity and change at once. She has said the move to breakfast felt like “a bit of a full circle moment” and that she had “the most glorious seven years of my career on teatime”, which suggests the launch is meant to carry over her existing audience without pretending the slot itself is the same.
Scott Mills and the handover
Radio 2 announced Cox in April as the new host of the station’s flagship programme after Scott Mills was removed from the role over allegations about his personal conduct. That background gives the handover a sharper edge than a routine schedule change: the station is not simply refreshing the line-up, it is resetting a high-profile show and using Cox to stabilise it.
Cox said when she was announced that she was “ecstatic, honoured and incredibly chuffed”, and that she could not wait to wake the nation up with “the biggest most fun breakfast show ever”. The new format now has to turn that promise into something listeners can hear immediately on the first morning, not after a long settling-in period.
Cox’s first morning
Cox said she was going to set 42 alarm clocks for the early start, which is the kind of detail that tells you exactly how little margin there is in breakfast radio. If the show lands, the first test is simple: a 6.30am debut, a high-profile first guest, and a format that has to feel new without losing the parts her audience already expects.
