Podtrac: Podcast Rankings Steady in July, With iHeart Still On Top.

Summertime is often marked by media habits that are disrupted, but some podcast publishers weathered the seasonal bump just fine in July. Podtrac says among the U.S. publishers it measures, five of the top 20 saw their unique users climb from June. And six had more downloads.

The ranking remains relatively stable. Podtrac reports another double win for iHeartPodcasts. Podtrac says it again ranked as the biggest individual publisher among those it measures with 30 million U.S. listeners in July, and 162 million downloads and streams. At the same time, the iHeart Audience Network — which includes not only its shows but roughly 22,000 podcasts from other publishers — had a combined 64 million U.S. listeners in July and 335 million downloads and streams.

The NPR Sales Network, which includes 68 podcasts from public media producers, logged 117 million downloads last month as its U.S. audience reached nearly 20 million.

The third-place network position was a split decision. Acast sales network had more listeners than Libsyn by a 19.5 million to 19.3 million margin. But Libsyn won in terms of downloads, with 81 million vs. 75 million for Acast.

July brought another win for the iHeart Audience Network not just in the U.S. but across the globe. Podtrac says it was the biggest global network last month with 762 million downloads, streams and YouTube views. Podtrac says iHeart’s total included more than 246 million YouTube views.

Acast was the second-largest global network measured by Podtrac in July. It measured 373 million downloads, streams and views for the 63,832 shows in Acast’s network — the biggest by far of any measured by Podtrac.

Libsyn ranked third globally with 286 million downloads last month. Like iHeart, its results were also given a significant tailwind by YouTube views. Podtrac says it counted more than 173 million video views to YouTube shows worldwide last month.

Paramount remained ahead of Sonoro Global Media to finish in fourth place during July. Podtrac says Paramount’s network continues to be powered by more YouTube views than audio downloads. It says the 131 shows in Paramount’s network had 40 million YouTube views worldwide in July, while its audio downloads and streams totaled 22 million.

There also remains plenty of stability at the top of Podtrac’s monthly ranking of the most listened-to shows among the publishers it measures. News Now, the on-demand hourly newscast from the public radio network, remained in first place in July. 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.

There was some movement in the top, however, as Fox Audio Network’s Fox News Hourly Update swapped spots with NBC News true crime series Dateline NBC. And in the top 10, iHeart’s Stuff You Should Know jumped two spots to No. 8 — trading spots with This American Life, which fell back to tenth place.

Several shows also entered the top 20, including The Tucker Carlson Show, which advanced six spots to No. 18 in July. Indie comedy series The Tim Dillon Show made its Podtrac debut at No. 19. And NPR’s Planet Money jumped 11 places, to finish at No. 20 last month.

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.