Reuters Institute: News Podcasts On The Increase

The number of news podcasts globally rose by almost 12,000 between January and October 2019 – an increase of around a third (32%), according to a new report from the Reuters Institute, one of the first to try to categorize this emerging sector. Talk and interview shows are the most popular sub-genre within news, along with one-off narrative series, but daily news has become an increasingly important focus.

The report has identified almost 60 daily news podcasts in five countries studied (US, UK, Australia, France and Sweden) – the majority of which have launched in the last 18 months. Some of the most popular news podcasts in the United States – such as The Daily from the New York Times – are attracting audiences of millions while others are struggling in an increasingly competitive market. The report finds that publishers are making significant investments in news podcasting hoping to attract younger audiences, build habit, and bring in additional revenue. Lead author Nic Newman says news podcasting is a rare bright spot for the news industry:

"Bigger audiences, better measurement and easier access have combined to change the economics of news podcasting. In turn this is encouraging publishers to invest in creating more quality content, and platforms to invest in better distribution and monetisation, in a virtuous circle of growth"

The report finds that interest from advertisers is much higher in the United States than in other countries, where so far there has also been less investment in original (native) news content. Although listening to news podcasts does attract younger audiences these tend to be richer and better educated. Unlike radio, podcasting has not yet broken through with mainstream audiences.

The report documents the evolution of daily news podcasts starting with The Gist (Slate) in 2014. The format of one big story pioneered by The Daily has inspired similar shows in other countries including in the UK (Today in Focus/The Guardian), Sweden (Aftonbladet Daily) and France (La Story/Les Echos and Code Source/Le Parisien)

The research identifies three sub-categories of daily news podcasts:

• Micro-bulletins with a length of between 1 and 5 minutes e.g. BBC Minute.
• News round-ups with a length of between 6 and 15 minutes e.g. Up First (NPR)
• Deep dives with a length of between 15 and 30 minutes e.g. The Daily (The New York Times)