Born in the U.S., podcast listening continues to spread around the globe. YouGov says its latest worldwide survey of how podcast consumption is growing shows four in ten listeners in 47 countries surveyed say they listen to podcasts for more than an hour per week. And 10% say they listen to podcasts for more than 10 hours per week.
Podcast listeners in the U.S. are right on the mark, with 39% of Americans surveyed by YouGov saying they listen to podcasts on a weekly basis. But Canadians have been slower to adopt podcasts. Only 31% of them listen more than one hour per week. It is a different story south of the border. YouGov says 48% of those surveyed in Mexico say they listen to podcasts on a weekly basis.
“While podcasting is a truly global medium, it has achieved uneven penetration across markets,” YouGov says. It points to the Asia-Pacific region where podcast listening has grown rapidly. Indonesia, at 57%, and Thailand, at 52%, have some of the highest rates of weekly podcast listening, while in Japan only 10% listen to an hour of podcasts or more per week.
In the U.K., the best international market for many American podcast companies, YouGov says podcast listening is well below average with only 26% saying they spend an hour a week listening. Of the 22 European markets polled, YouGov says only Romania (47%) has significantly more podcast listeners that the average of all consumers. And while Spain and Sweden are about average with podcast listening rates at 41%, countries such as Belgium (21%) and the Netherlands (24%) have smaller numbers of regular podcast listeners.
In Australia, another strong international market for U.S. producers, 37% of those surveyed said they listen to podcasts on a weekly basis.
U.S. podcasters may want to focus on the Middle East and Afrida, where YouGov says it surveys found higher rates of podcast listening – including in several countries where no translators are required. South Africa is home to the highest proportion of regular podcast listeners of any market surveyed, at 68%. Saudi Arabia is second overall at 59%., followed by Egypt (56%), UAE (53%) and Morocco (45%). It says only Lebanon, at 31%, falls below the overall proportion of regular podcast listeners.
YouGov says there is a “podcast boom” in Latin America. Beyond nearly half of Mexicans saying they listen to podcasts regularly, the habit is also catching on in Brazil (44%) and Colombia (37%), which it says indicates a robust growth in podcast consumption.
The YouGov data is collected from more than 1,000 adults in 47 countries. That includes a panel of adults aged 18 and older in the U.S., the UK., Australia, India, and the UAE.
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