The return of Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman in BBC1’s Sherlock was the most popular programme on the BBC’s iPlayer in 2014, pipping Jeremy Clarkson’s Top Gear to the top in a record year for on-demand viewing.

Nearly 4.2 million viewers requested the first episode of the latest series of the detective series, aired on New Year’s Day, in which the mystery of how Holmes survived a rooftop plunge was finally revealed.

Among the select number of BBC shows that aired only on the iPlayer, Frankie Boyle’s Referendum Autopsy, in which he discussed the outcome of the Scottish independence poll, was among the most popular online-only shows with 715,000 requests.

Sherlock accounted for three of the top 10 most-accessed programmes on the iPlayer last year. Top Gear took another four of the top 10 slots, including its controversial Burma special, later criticised for using an offensive racial term.

In all there were a record 3.5bn requests for TV and radio programmes on the iPlayer – 2.6bn for TV content and 860m for radio output – up from a total of 3.1 bn in 2013.

The top 10 also included BBC3’s acclaimed domestic violence drama Murdered By My Boyfriend, which was the most popular TV show on mobile with 1.1m requests on people’s phones out of a total of just over 3m.

Viewing on mobiles and tablets continued to dominate iPlayer growth, with a 51% increase in requests from tablets, up to 801m in 2013, and mobile up 32% to 662m.

Both are bigger than the number of people who watch the iPlayer on their TV, up 13% to 626m requests.

Other most requested TV shows included Peter Capaldi’s first full episode in Doctor Who, three episodes of the final series of BBC1 sitcom Outnumbered, two outings of The Apprentice and the return of The Great British Bake Off for its first series on BBC1.

The BBC has also looked to put more exclusive content on the iPlayer, with BBC3 due to go online only later this year if proposals, published this week, are approved by the BBC Trust.

Along with Frankie Boyle’s Referendum Autopsy, the BBC’s iPlayer-only Original Comedy Shorts, featuring Bob Mortimer, Matt Berry and Meera Syal, had of 1.9m requests, with its Original Drama shows accessed a total of 1.2m times.

In radio, the most popular programmes were dominated by Test Match Special’s coverage of England’s 3-1 cricket win against India, including more than 300,000 requests for the opening day of the fourth Test at Old Trafford.

Also in the iPlayer radio top 10 are Manchester City’s 3-0 win over Manchester United on 25 March and Carl Froch’s super middleweight title fight win over George Groves in their Wembley rematch on 31 May.

Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss, the co-creators of Sherlock, said: “Really thrilling to see Sherlock at the very top of the iPlayer ratings.

“We always knew he’d survive jumping off that building, but we never thought he’d fly so high.”

Top 20 TV episodes requested on BBC iPlayer, 2014

1 Sherlock, series 3 episode 1 4.19 million
2 Top Gear, series 21 episode 1, 3.81 million
3 Top Gear, series 21 episode 3, 3.42 million
4 Top Gear, Burma special part 1, 3.34 million
5 Sherlock, series 3 episode 2, 3.33 million
6 Sherlock series 3 episode 3, 3.21 million
7 Top Gear series 21 episode 2, 3.08 million
8 Murdered By My Boyfriend, 23 June, 3.02 million
9 Outnumbered, series 5 episode 1, 2.86 million
10 Doctor Who, series 8 episode 1, 2.8 million
11 Top Gear, Burma special part 2, 2.79 million
12 Top Gear, series 21 episode 4, 2.55 million
13 Top Gear, series 21 episode 5, 2.46 million
14 The Great British Bake Off, series 5 episode 1, 2.31 million
15 Top Gear, Patagonia Special part 1, 2.29 million
16 Outnumbered, series 5 episode 2, 2.24 million
17 Outnumbered, series 5 episode 3, 2.17 million
18 The Apprentice, series 10, episode 4, 2.09 million
19 The Apprentice, series 10, episode 7, 2.07 million
20 Outnumbered, series 5 episode 4, 2.07 million