Chartable released its latest podcast report which details 2020 measurements and makes a few general predictions for 2021. View the report HERE.
Overall, the data and tone of the report are bullish. “At Chartable, we’ve seen incredible growth in every metric we track from both publishers and advertisers—and we expect 2021 to be an even better year as the world returns to normalcy,” said report author Dave Zohrob, Co-founder and CEO.
“At Chartable, we’ve seen incredible growth in every metric we track from both publishers and advertisers—and we expect 2021 to be an even better year as the world returns to normalcy.” The key metrics are laid out below:
The report notes that 23% of podcasts started in 2021 have already published more than 10 episodes, which adds up to more than 200,000 new podcasts with what Zohrob calls “real staying power.” Interestingly, just under half of the 900,000 new podcasts were in languages other than English.
Chartable-measured US traffic grew 190% in 2020. Some other countries saw even greater increases, including Turkey, Italy, Peru, and others.
The report concerns itself with share of listening among the key distributors. Spotify’s share of listening grew significantly in 2020, as legacy leader Apple reduced its portion. As you can see in the chart below, Apple lost about five percent of its listener share (as measured by unique devices) while Spotify gaine about the same percentage. The result is that Spotify gained roughly 10% on Apple.
One of the most interesting graphics in Chartable’s review illustrates the share of Apple Podcasts top 200 in 2020 by podcast host — in other words, which tech platforms hosted the most podcasts which reached the Apple list. Megaphone wins that distinction, with (what appears to be) more than a quarter of them:
Consolidation is the big podcast ecosystem story of 2020, in Chartable’s report, and although the document doesn’t offer any numeric predictions for 2021, it does itemize key questions: “Will we end up with an ecosystem more like on-demand TV, where every media company has its own app and listeners (and advertisers!) need to juggle different platforms? Will Amazon or other tech companies continue to invest in podcasting to catch up (or surpass) Spotify? How will independent producers and networks thrive in this era of corporate consolidation?”
And on a more general note of optimism: “2021 is going to be a great year for audio.”
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