Spreaker
Owned by: iHeartMedia
Owns
Latest news
- Apr 3: Spotify for Podcasters increased its share in March to 23.1% of all new episodes: a six month high for the podcast host formerly known as Anchor. Spotify's Megaphone also posted an all-time high. At #3, iHeart's Spreaker saw a dramatic increase from 5.4% to 6.5%, perhaps due to a misleading announcement that the platform was "now free" (it was just a small tweak on already existing free accounts). Buzzsprout remains at #2.
- Mar 10: A free podcast transcription tool has been launched. It runs entirely on your own local device ("for the highest privacy and security"), the company says; it uses whisper.cpp's "tiny" model. It's powered by Spreaker, though you don't need to be a customer to use it. It hosts the SRT file itself, which is ideal to add it to your RSS feed.
- Mar 6: Hmm: Spreaker's "free professional hosting", promised in a press release that Podnews covered on Friday, appears to be just a small tweak to the company's already existing free plan. After the press release's title, "Spreaker goes free", and the first paragraph, "Starting today, creators can use Spreaker’s professional podcast platform at zero cost," we were misled into believing this was a new offer. Sorry.
- Mar 3: Podcast hosting company Spreaker is now free, claiming that it is "the first ever professional-level podcast platform" to be available at no cost. Features like unlimited storage and programmatic monetisation, previously only available in an enterprise package from the iHeart-owned platform, are now free for all podcast creators. The release describes existing free alternatives as "mediocre" and "very basic". Here's a deep-dive into their platform from Sounds Profitable.
- Mar 1:
Spreaker has partnered with Musixmatch to offer transcriptions for podcasts. Creators hosted on Spreaker will be able to automatically transcribe their podcasts; it uses the
podcast:transcriptfeature to appear in supporting podcast apps.
Data credits: Podnews newsletter