Apple Loses Its Podcasting Lead to YouTube and Spotify

How Apple lost its lead in podcasts

Apple Inc. popularized the concept of podcasts in 2005 when Steve Jobs announced the company would support the audio format in iTunes, its pioneering music and media platform. The move allowed people to follow their favorite shows, discover new ones and listen regularly.

Despite Apple’s long lead, Spotify Technology SA. and Alphabet Inc.’s YouTube have now become the most popular places to listen to podcasts.

A study published last month, from Cumulus Media and Signal Hill Insights, shows YouTube — a traditionally visual platform — as the most popular podcast listening platform in the US, with 31% of respondents saying they use it. It’s followed by Spotify at 21% and Apple at 12%.

Looking at the historical data, Apple’s share has been shrinking for a while. In July 2019, 29% of weekly podcast listeners said they used the app the most.

Now, “YouTube is the entryway into podcasting, whereas you could make a strong argument that using Apple Podcasts was the predominant way to become a podcast listener and consumer if you go back 10 years,” said Paul Riismandel, president at Signal Hill Insights.

Apple Podcasts' Popularity Wanes as YouTube Grows

Percentage of weekly podcast listeners who said a given platform was their most used

So what happened?

A few things. For one, Apple Podcasts didn’t generate any revenue for the majority of its existence. Apple doesn’t sell podcast ads, and only in 2021 did the company launch podcast subscriptions, which requires the shows to give Apple a cut of revenue. Without contributing to revenue, it’s hard to imagine the world’s biggest company caring much about promoting its podcast product other than as a sweetener to sell more hardware. (Other new features, like transcripts — which I genuinely do love — seem unlikely to recruit waves of listeners to the service.)

Also, Google’s Android remains the most popular mobile operating system around the world, and until recently, if you were on an Android or Microsoft Windows device, you couldn’t access Apple Podcasts. That changed this week though, as Apple launched an Apple Podcasts web app, available regardless of whether users are on a Mac or not.

The one place Apple seems to maintain a lead is when podcasters count “downloads” instead of “listeners.” But even that headway appears to be fading. Beginning in April, Spotify surpassed Apple Podcasts in monthly downloads for podcasters using the hosting service Buzzsprout.

Triton Digital, another hosting service, found last year that Apple still received the most downloads but that the majority of listeners said they consumed podcasts on YouTube, followed by Spotify and then Apple.

“With Apple being the longest-serving and largest podcast platform, it follows that they would have a higher portion of downloads from very engaged and long-time podcast listeners who consume more content,” said Sharon Taylor, senior vice president of podcast strategy and product operations at Triton.

Nearly a year ago, Apple adjusted the way downloads reach listeners on Apple Podcasts. Up until the rollout of iOS 17, listeners who consumed an episode after some time away would automatically download the show’s unplayed back catalog. In other words, lots of downloads that still probably went unheard. After iOS 17, those downloads stopped happening. This meant a lot of longtime podcasts saw their downloads taper off as people updated their operating systems.

A Podscribe report from this month found that, from a sampling of the top 500 podcasts, downloads dropped by around 50% from a year ago.

But maybe the biggest recent reason Apple Podcasts has faded in popularity is its lack of focus on video – ironically the hottest podcast format at the moment. YouTube, Instagram and TikTok all push podcast clips through their algorithms, driving audiences to check out shows. Newer listeners might now associate podcasts with video more than they did in the past.

“Video seems to be where there’s definite growth, and they’re not even trying on that,” said Pierre Bouvard, chief insights officer at Cumulus Media, a radio conglomerate and podcast company, referring to Apple. (Apple Podcasts does support video distributed through RSS feeds, though the app doesn’t emphasize them in any way.)

Apple declined to comment.

The Podcasts app still exists on Apple products by default, meaning it could easily become a power player again. But Apple likely needs to double down on video, offer better monetization for podcasters and actively recruit new and younger listeners to the platform to regain its crown.