Creating a centralized podcast destination on YouTube Music
Sep 26, 2023 – [[read-time]] minute read
We’re living in the golden age of podcasts. We’ve seen creators and artists really embrace Podcasts on YouTube, and its incredible potential to boost audience growth across audio and video formats. That's why, earlier this year, we launched the ability to watch and listen to podcasts on YouTube Music in the US, without requiring a paid membership. Podcasts on YouTube Music in the US already include access to downloads, background play in places like the car and on smart speakers as well as the ability to switch between audio and video podcasts. We plan to make Podcasts on YouTube Music globally available before the end of the year.
Looking forward to 2024, we’ll be increasing our investment in the podcast experience on YouTube Music — making it a better overall destination for fans and podcasters alike.
Looking forward to 2024, we’ll be increasing our investment in the podcast experience on YouTube Music — making it a better overall destination for fans and podcasters alike with YouTube-only capabilities across community, discovery and audio/visual switching. Later in 2024, as part of this process, we’ll be discontinuing Google Podcasts. As part of this process, we’ll be helping Google Podcasts users move over to Podcasts in YouTube Music. This matches what listeners and podcasters are already doing: according to Edison, about 23% of weekly podcast users in the US say YouTube is their most frequently used service, versus just 4% for Google Podcasts.
We want to make sure we get this right and will give fans and podcasters plenty of time to make the transition. For users, it means a simple migration tool and the ability to add podcast RSS feeds to their YouTube Music library, including shows not currently hosted by YouTube. For those who prefer a different listening platform, the tools will also include an option to download an OPML file of their show subscriptions, which they can upload to an app that supports their import. For podcasters, this means providing robust creation and analytics tools, as well as RSS uploads, in addition to making your podcasts available everywhere YouTube Music listeners are already consuming their favorite content–in the background, in the car, offline, and more.
In the coming weeks and months, we'll gather feedback to make the migration process from Google Podcasts to YouTube Music as simple and easy as possible. Once we feel the migration tools are ready, we’ll release them along with clear guidelines on how they work.
We know this transition will take time, but these efforts will allow us to build an amazing product and a single destination that rewards creators and artists and provides fans with the best Podcasts experience. For now, nothing is changing and fans will continue to have access to YouTube, YouTube Music and Google Podcasts. We’re committed to being transparent in communicating future changes with our users and podcasters and will have more to share about this process in the coming months.