Podcast Listening Climbs In October; iHeart, And NPR Lead As Audiences Rebound.

October brought in more listeners and downloads, according to Podtrac, which reports that among the publishers it measures most posted month-to-month gains in both their U.S. downloads and overall unique monthly audience numbers. It continues a season trend that typically sees improvement after a late-summer drop-off in listening. Podtrac reports that among those it measures, 16 of the top 20 saw an increase in U.S. downloads last month vs. September. And 14 publishers had a larger unique monthly audience last month.

The top spot was again held by iHeartPodcasts and its related ad network. Podtrac says iHeartPodcasts had 180 million downloads and streams during October. That was a 6% increase from September, as similarly sized gains meant iHeart had 34 million unique U.S. listeners last month.

At the same time, the iHeart Audience Network — which includes not only its shows but roughly 21,000 podcasts from other publishers — had a combined 378 355 million downloads and streams in October, which was up 6% from September. And it had 70 million U.S. listeners, which was up 2 million from the prior month.

Acast and NPR split third place in the Podtrac ranker, which reports the Acast sales network of shows had 78 million downloads in the U.S. during October, with a unique audience of 21 million. But while Acast had a bigger reach, NPR had significantly more downloads — it totaled 118 million in October, which was up 2% month-over-month.

Libsyn rounds out the top five. Podtrac says it had 94 million downloads and a U.S. reach of nearly 21 million last month.

Podtrac reports “The Charlie Kirk Show” slid back out of the top 10 shows last month, but it remained one of the biggest podcasts for the month of October. It ranked at No. 11 for the month as a series of temporary hosts have covered hosting duties for the Salem Podcast Network show.

The big mover for the month was iHeart’s “On Purpose with Jay Shetty,” that advance four spots and into the top ten. Its ninth-place finish knocked iHeart sister series “Stuff You Should Know” bank to No. 10.

October did bring some minor moves up and down across Podtrac’s top 20, but it says the top five remained the same vs. September. It reports “NPR News Now,” the on-demand hourly newscast from the public radio network, remained in first place in September. That kept it in front of The New York Times morning news podcast “The Daily,” which ranked second, edging out NPR’s morning news podcast Up First, which again held onto third place last month. It was followed by Fox Audio Network’s “Fox News Hourly Update” and the NBC News true crime series “Dateline NBC.”

Podtrac also reports that five of the top global networks had more downloads, streams and YouTube views in October vs. September. The iHeart Audience Network again topped the ranking, with its shows logging 849 million, up 3% month-to-month. The total was boosted by 270 million YouTube views for the 91 shows that are distributed on the video streaming platform.

The latest update shows it wasn’t a fluke in September and there are now two networks that receive more consumption via YouTube than audio RSS in the global ranker. Podtrac says Sonoro had 39 million YouTube views last month compared to 29 million audio listens even though just five of its 192 shows are on YouTube.

It is a similar story for Paramount. It had 34 million YouTube views vs. 25 million audio RSS downloads and streams. That came even though just 38 of its 135 shows are on YouTube. Paramount’s stable of shows includes brands like BET, CBS, Comedy Central, MTV, Nickelodeon, Paramount Pictures, Showtime, and others.

Also worth noting is only one of the publishers on the global ranker — American Public Media — does not distribute any of its 63 podcasts on YouTube.

The ranking is based on Podtrac measurement data for U.S. unique monthly audience for any show that was measured for the entire month. While measurement is free for any podcast, the ranking only includes those shows that have opted in. It means that some of the biggest podcasts, like “The Joe Rogan Experience,” and shows from companies like SiriusXM, Spotify and Wondery, are not included in the measurement.