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🗓️ 18.12.2025
Podcast Statistics 2025
🕒 10 min read 🧑 by Sarah Fulford-Williams
Table of Contents
Podcast Stats 2025
Introduction
Podcasting has leaped from niche hobby to mainstream medium, becoming a trusted companion for commuters, fitness buffs and lifelong learners.
Whether you’re into true crime, comedy or business advice, there’s a show for you – and more listeners than ever are tuning in.
The statistics below illustrate the explosive growth of podcasting and hint at where the industry is headed next.
Quick Summary ✅
- Podcasting continues to boom worldwide, with growth in both audience size and industry revenue.
- By 2025, there were 4.52 million podcasts indexed globally and an estimated 584.1 million listeners, up 6.83% from 2024.
- The podcast market is projected to reach $39.63 billion in 2025, highlighting its commercial potential.
Key Podcast Statistics 📈
| Metric | Statistic | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Number of Podcasts |
|
podcastatistics.com |
| Active Podcasts |
|
thepodcasthost.com |
| Podcast Listeners Worldwide |
|
backlinko.com |
| Projected Growth |
|
backlinko.com |
| US Monthly Listeners |
|
backlinko.com |
| Demographics |
|
backlinko.com |
| Gender |
|
backlinko.com |
| Most Popular Platforms |
|
backlinko.com |
| Time Spent |
|
podcastatistics.com |
| Device Usage |
|
backlinko.com |
| Video Podcasts |
|
backlinko.com |
| Ad Spending |
|
backlinko.com |
These figures underline YouTube’s global reach and provide context for the UK market. With a high ad‑reach rate and heavy daily usage, UK marketers can tap into a deeply engaged audience.
Growth in Podcasts & Listeners
Number of podcasts
- In September 2025 there were 4.52 million podcasts indexed globally.
- The number of podcasts has grown from around 550,000 in 2018 (Apple WWDC data) to over 4.5 million in 2025, illustrating explosive growth.
- Only ~15% of podcasts are active (i.e., released an episode in the last 90 days).
Podcast listeners
- Global listeners: 584.1 million in 2025, up from 546.7 million in 2024.
- United States: 158 million monthly listeners (55 % of the 12+ population).
- Other countries: The U.S. (129.9 million), China (117.1 million), Brazil (51.8 million) and Mexico (27.5 million) are top markets.
- Time spent: On average, podcast listeners spend about seven hours per week, with dedicated fans consuming more than eight episodes per week.
Demographics & Listening Habits
- Age: 18-44‑year‑olds account for 59% of U.S. podcast listeners.
- Gender: Roughly 51% male, 48% female, and 1% non‑binary.
- Political affiliation (U.S.): 53% of Democrats and 56% of Republicans listen to podcasts – showing cross‑party appeal.
Preferred platforms and devices
- Platforms: YouTube is the most used platform for podcasts in the U.S., preferred by 39% of weekly listeners, followed by Spotify (21%) and Apple Podcasts (8%).
- Devices: 70% of U.S. weekly podcast consumers use a mobile phone to listen; computers/laptops (12%), TV (8 %), tablets (5%) and smart speakers (4%) follow.
- Video podcasts: 41% of U.S. weekly listeners prefer to watch podcasts, while 30% like audio‑only and 29% listen while a video plays in the background.
- Podcast completion: True crime and fiction podcasts have completion rates as high as 85%.
Industry Revenue & Advertising
- Global market size: The podcast industry is estimated to be worth $39.63 billion in 2025, up from $30.72 billion in 2024.
- Advertising: Worldwide podcast ad spending will reach $4.46 billion in 2025, with the U.S. contributing $2.55 billion.
- Monetization models: Podcasters generate revenue via ads, sponsorships, listener donations (e.g., Patreon), paid subscriptions and live events.
✨ OOB’s Thoughts ✨
Everyone and their dog has a podcast now. And we love listening to them – on the train, in the gym, making dinner. Podcasting has gone from a niche internet hobby to a full-blown cultural staple. It’s intimate, flexible, and refreshingly human. You don’t just consume a podcast, you build a relationship with it. Hosts become familiar voices. Episodes become rituals.
The biggest shift we’ve seen with podcasts in 2025 is that they’re no longer just something you listen to. Video podcasts have changed the game, and YouTube is now one of the world’s biggest podcast platforms. Suddenly, podcasts are watchable, shareable, meme-able. A great clip can travel faster than a full episode ever could, and creators know it.
Conclusion
Podcasting has transformed from a niche medium into a mainstream channel with hundreds of millions of listeners and billions in ad revenue.
Growth is still strong but slowing slightly as the market matures.
For marketers and content creators, focusing on high‑engagement genres (comedy, true crime, society & culture) and leveraging video podcasts on YouTube or Spotify can help reach younger, mobile‑first audiences.
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Sources
FAQs 📌
Podcasts: Frequently Asked Questions
The audience is huge and still growing. About 584 million people worldwide listen to podcasts in 2025 (around a 6.8% increase from last year) podcastatistics.com. In the U.S. alone, roughly 158 million people (55% of Americans 12 or older) are monthly podcast listeners podcastatistics.com – the first time more than half the country is tuning in regularly. Young adults lead the way (about 66% of Americans age 12–34 listen monthly, compared to ~38% of those 55+ podcastatistics.com), but older groups are catching up as podcasts go mainstream across demographics.
Podcast advertising is still climbing year-over-year. Globally, ad spend is set to reach around $5 billion in 2025 (about +8% from 2024) marketingprofs.com. In the U.S., the industry cracked $2 billion in ad revenue in 2024 (after ~26% growth) emarketer.com and is on track for around $2.5 billion in 2025 emarketer.com. Why all the growth? Marketers have noticed that podcast listeners tend to trust and act on ads – surveys show roughly 68% of listeners have made a purchase based on a podcast ad or recommendation tveyes.com. In short, the money is following the ears.
You might be surprised, but YouTube is now a top podcast platform. About one in three U.S. podcast fans say they listen on YouTube, making it more popular than Spotify (~26%) or Apple Podcasts (~14%) podcastatistics.com. In fact, YouTube announced it surpassed 1 billion monthly podcast users globally as of early 2025 techcrunch.com. Spotify and Apple are still heavy hitters, of course, but the rise of video podcasts (and YouTube’s massive reach) has really shaken up the podcast platform rankings.
Comedy is currently king – it makes up around 30% of all podcast listening hours worldwide podcastatistics.com. Other top genres include society & culture (~18% of listening time) and lifestyle/health (~15%) podcastatistics.com. In the U.S., comedy also sits at #1, followed by news and society & culture as listener favorites podcastatistics.com. Of course, perennial favorites like true crime, sports, and business podcasts are also hugely popular across many audiences (true crime, for one, has some of the most dedicated listeners).
Podcast fans are spending quite a bit of time – about 7 hours per week on average – listening to their favorite shows podcastatistics.com. The vast majority listen on the go via their phones (roughly 86% of podcast listeners use mobile devices) podcastatistics.com. Another big trend: video podcasts are gaining ground. Approximately 4 in 10 U.S. podcast listeners now say they watch podcasts (thanks largely to YouTube) instead of just listening backlinko.com. In other words, people are multitasking less and actually watching podcast episodes, blurring the line between traditional “listening” and viewing. This mix of audio and video consumption is a notable shift in 2025’s podcasting landscape.
