In 2022, the number of households paying for podcasts has grown strongly. But close to all paying households also pay for another audio service. This is concluded in Mediavision’s latest analysis of the Swedish audio market.

The market for paid podcasts shows strong growth in Q4 2022, as the number of paying households increased by a whopping 85 percent compared to the same period 2021. But pretty much all households that pay for podcasts (97 percent) also pay for audiobook and/or music services. This means that the paid market for podcasts basically add no households to the total paid audio market (i.e. music, audiobook and podcasts).

More and more media actors have also chosen to invest in podcasts, both production and/or publishing. The big overlap between the paid audio categories, where podcast households already pay for other audio services, could become a challenge for some podcast services.

– If households increasingly get access to podcasts as part of other subscriptions, the willingness to pay for pure podcast services is likely to decrease, comments Fredrik Liljeqvist, senior analyst at Mediavision. We have already seen how major actors such as Spotify, audiobook services and newspapers, have broadened their scope by including podcasts in their services. 2023 will give us an indication of how the market for paid podcasts will develop. There are indications that podcasts will increasingly be “bundled” with other media in the future. This may possibly be driven by a declining economy, where households also look over their media spending.