Podtrac February Rankings: iHeart Leads Publishers, Bongino Podcast Rebounds.

Podcast listening remained steady in February as the industry moved beyond the early-year reset, with Podtrac’s latest publisher rankings showing several networks posting gains in audience and downloads while the biggest players maintained their grip atop the chart.

The February data keeps iHeartMedia firmly in the lead, with the iHeart Audience Network once again ranking as the largest podcast publisher measured by Podtrac. The network delivered 60.7 million U.S. monthly listeners and 320.7 million downloads and streams across its portfolio of more than 30,000 shows.

iHeart’s owned content arm, iHeartPodcasts, held onto the No. 2 position with 29.2 million U.S. listeners and 157.0 million downloads and streams across nearly 900 podcasts.

Behind the iHeart pair, Acast ranked third with 24.1 million listeners and 88.2 million downloads and streams, reflecting the continued reach of its global podcast marketplace. The NPR Sales Network followed in fourth place with 19.8 million U.S. listeners, while generating 109.7 million downloads and streams across its lineup of news and storytelling programs. Libsyn rounded out the top five with 17.9 million listeners and 80.8 million downloads and streams.

Podtrac says the latest report also showed some month-to-month growth among participating publishers, with two of the ranked publishers increasing their unique U.S. monthly audience compared with January. In addition, two publishers posted gains in U.S. downloads and streams versus the previous month.

Podtrac’s February podcast rankings show news and daily update programs continuing to dominate the medium’s largest audiences, with several familiar titles holding steady near the top of the chart.

Leading the list again was “NPR News Now,” which retained the No. 1 position among participating podcasts measured by Podtrac. The short-form hourly news update has consistently ranked among the most widely listened-to podcasts thanks to its frequent publishing schedule and broad distribution across listening platforms.

The New York Times’ flagship news podcast “The Daily” held onto the No. 2 spot, while NPR’s morning news program “Up First” remained in third place, underscoring the continued demand for quick, on-demand news briefings. NBC News’ true-crime program “Dateline NBC” ranked fourth in February, followed by “Fox News Hourly Update” at No. 5. Together the top five shows highlight how news and current events programming continues to anchor the largest audiences in podcasting.

The biggest mover was the reconstituted “The Dan Bongino Show” at No. 9. The show relaunched last month after Bongino returned to podcasting following a nine-month stint as FBI Deputy Director.

Podtrac’s February global delivery chart highlights how YouTube continues to reshape the scale of podcast distribution, with video views now accounting for a significant share of listening and viewing across several major networks.

The iHeart Audience Network again led the global rankings with 740.6 million worldwide downloads, streams and views. While the majority still came through traditional RSS podcast delivery at 500.7 million, the network also generated 239.9 million YouTube views, meaning roughly one-third of its global consumption now comes from video platforms.

Acast, which placed second with 439.8 million global downloads and streams, reported activity entirely through RSS delivery. But YouTube’s influence is even more apparent for some publishers further down the chart. Libsyn, which ranked third globally with 282.8 million total deliveries, saw the majority of its activity come from YouTube. The company recorded 179.6 million YouTube views compared with 103.2 million RSS downloads, showing how video distribution can significantly expand the reach of podcast content.

The rankings are 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.