Edison Research Announces the Top 30 U.S. Podcasts, Q3 2019- Q2 2020

Somerville NJ, USA—Edison Research announces the U.S. Top 30 Podcast ranker from its subscription product, the Podcast Consumer Tracker (PCT). The PCT is the only comprehensive and all-inclusive study of the reach of podcast networks and shows in America. The Joe Rogan Experience continues to be the number one podcast in America as it has been since the PCT was established in the summer of 2019.

The ranker lists the top thirty podcasts in America by reach -- not downloads -- among weekly podcast consumers, covering the full survey period from July 7, 2019 through June 24, 2020. Reach is the percentage of weekly podcast listeners who say they have listened to any one of these shows in the last week.

“Even with the work and life disruptions caused by COVID-19, people did continue listening to their favorite podcasts, and we ultimately saw little to no reduction in reach among weekly podcast listeners”. noted Edison Research SVP Tom Webster. “We’re pleased to publish the only ranker that covers the entire U.S. podcasting industry.”

The top thirty podcasts in the U.S, as ranked by the percentage of weekly podcast consumers 18+ who have listened to them, are as follows:

1 The Joe Rogan Experience
2 The Daily
3 This American Life
4 My Favorite Murder
5 Crime Junkie
6 Stuff You Should Know
7 Wait Wait… Don’t Tell Me!
8 Planet Money
9 Pod Save America
10 Serial
11 Radiolab
12 Fresh Air
13 Office Ladies
14 The Dave Ramsey Show
15 Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend
16 WTF with Marc Maron
17 The Ben Shapiro Show
18 Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard
19 Freakonomics Radio
20= TED Talks Daily
20= Up First
22 Hidden Brain
23 Bill Simmons Podcast
24 Criminal
25 Last Podcast On The Left
26 Call Her Daddy
27 H3 Podcast
28 Lore
29= The Breakfast Club
29= The Moth

The Podcast Consumer Tracker is the only study that measures the entire podcast space continuously, as compared to other download rankers which only measure participants who opt in to those rankers, or users of a specific platform. Podcasts and podcast networks are ranked according to their weekly reach of podcast listeners. The PCT is sampled continuously throughout each quarter to negate the effects of limited releases and new shows and is weighted to the industry standard measure of podcast listening, The Infinite Dial® research series from Edison Research and Triton Digital®.

How the Study Was Conducted: The Podcast Consumer Tracker Q2 2020 Top 30 Ranker is based upon 8,080 online interviews with weekly podcast consumers in the United States, ages 18 and older. Interviews were conducted in English and Spanish. Sampling was conducted continuously from July 7, 2019 to June 24, 2020. All respondents were instructed to enter the names of all podcasts they listened to the week before the interview into an online diary and were provided instructions to obtain that information from their podcast client/player of choice. All responses were unaided and hand-coded by Edison Research to determine actual show name, producer, genre, and other information. Data is weighted to nationally representative numbers for weekly podcast consumers from The Infinite Dial 2020, from Edison Research and Triton Digital.

Fielding is continuous and currently underway for the next quarterly report in the series. Click here for more information on the Podcast Consumer Tracker.

About Edison Research

Edison Research conducts survey research and provides strategic information to a broad array of clients, including Activision, AMC Theatres, Disney, Dolby Laboratories, Google, Oracle, the U.S. International Broadcasting Bureau, Pandora, Samsung, Siemens, Sony, The Gates Foundation, and Univision. Edison is the leading podcast research company in the world and has conducted research on the medium for NPR, Slate, ESPN, PodcastOne, WNYC Studios, and many more companies in the space. Another specialty for Edison is its work for media companies throughout the world, conducting research in North America, South America, Africa, Asia, Australia, and Europe. Edison is also the leading provider of consumer exit polling and has conducted face-to-face research in almost every imaginable venue. Since 2004, Edison Research has been the sole provider of Election Day data to the National Election Pool, conducting exit polls and collecting precinct vote returns to project and analyze results for every major presidential primary and general election.