Audio Still Rules Podcast Consumption, Even As Video Makes Gains.

Results of the latest in an annual study of weekly podcast consumers shows that audio remains the primary mode of consumption, even as video podcasts’ popularity has grown.

The survey, commissioned by Cumulus Media and Signal Hill Insights and conducted by Quantilope among more than 600 weekly podcast consumers during April 2025, finds total audio podcast consumption at 58%, with 28% of respondents saying they listen via audio without any video and 30% listen while the video is minimized or plays in the background.

“Podcasts are unique among other media platforms, offering flexible multimedia opportunities where consumers have the option to either watch or listen,” Cumulus Media/Westwood One Audio Active Group Senior Insights Manager Liz Mayer says in an analysis of the study in Westwood One's blog. Mayer also notes that YouTube has been the leading podcast platform, and steadily growing, since 2022, and that 68% of weekly podcast consumers use YouTube, Spotify, or Apple Podcasts to listen or watch.

“[While] in the world of video streaming, the platform is most often the exclusive place to watch the show, every podcast can be consumed on any platform,” Mayer says.

The study also finds that “podcast newcomers” - as in those who started listening in the past year – have driven the popularity of video podcasts, with 40% saying they use YouTube most for podcasts, and 44% of those having consumed a new podcast in the last six months used YouTube.

“As the world’s entertainment search engine, YouTube’s features keep podcast audiences on the platform,” Mayer says. “Video, recommendations, comments, and autoplay are all cited as factors for utilizing YouTube for podcasts. A hefty proportion also indicate YouTube is already their primary entertainment and information destination.”

The blog also notes that without a regular available measurement of listeners per listening household, podcast audiences are undercounted, with downloads and listens underestimating the actual audience. The study backs this up, showing 43% of podcast consumers say they have consumed podcasts with friends, family, and kids, and 7% say they frequently listen with others.

“The false assumption is all podcast listening is an entirely solo affair without any co-listening,” Mayer says. “It is likely that podcasts’ 'listeners per listening household' is at least 1.1, a 10% greater audience than listeners or downloads would suggest. Current audience calculations based on downloads do not account for the percentage of podcast consumers who say they consume with others.”

As the popularity of podcasts has grown, so has advertiser interest, with use up from 15% to 59% since 2015, according to an Advertiser Perceptions survey. “Advertiser adoption of podcast ads continues to grow at a breakneck pace,” Mayer says, citing survey findings that “as an on-demand medium, podcasts deliver heavy viewers of ad-free video streaming. Podcast advertising works so well [because] podcasts hosts are three times more influential than social media influencers.”