Can Apple Podcasts sustain its phenomenal growth?

During the past year Apple has announced a number of improvements to the Podcast app and service, and although it might not be quite as good as third-party applications such as Overcast, it’s difficult to deny the massive size of this platform.

According to Fast Company, Apple Podcasts has achieved a major milestone in terms of streams and downloads.

Its report reveals that in March this year Apple Podcasts broke through the 50 billion all-time episode streams and downloads barrier. That is a huge increase if one considers that last year’s figure still stood at 13.7 billion. The figure includes downloads in the Podcasts app, iTunes and other streams.

As the content grew over the years, so did the fan base. In 2014, the number of podcasts reached 7 billion. Two years later it stood at 10.5 billion. Last year it surged to 13.7 billion episode streams and downloads. And over the last year it nearly quadrupled to 50 billion.

Apple introduced support for iTunes and Podcasts 13 years ago in 2005, and since then the platform has experienced phenomenal growth. According to Fast Company, there are more than 18.5 million episodes and 525 active shows available on the platform, spanning no less than 155 countries and 100 languages.

The Cupertino-based firm claimed 15 million episodes and 400,000 podcasts at its WWDC conference in 2017.
The company improved the Podcasts platform in a number of ways last year. For instance, it introduced support for Podcast Analytics and seasons, and announced interface upgrades to the iOS version of Podcasts.

The massive growth of Apple’s Podcasts service comes at a time when Apple Senior Vice President of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue recommitted the company to this media format. Addressing the Code Media conference in 2017, he promised that Apple had various new features for the Podcasts platform in the pipeline, adding that it “absolutely” should do more.