Swedish market for paid podcasts growing rapidly: Mediavision

The Swedish market for paid podcasts is growing rapidly. In the first quarter of 2023, a record number of households paid for podcast content. Compared to the same period last year, households spend on paid podcasts has nearly doubled. This is concluded in Mediavision’s latest analysis of the Swedish audio market.

In Sweden, an increasing number of people both listen to and pay for podcasts. During the first quarter of the year, a sharp increase in paying households is noted, which results in major growth in turnover for the podcast market. Over half a million households paid for podcasts during the first quarter of the year, or 230,000 more than the same period last year. Paid podcasts are either subscription services (usually with multiple titles) or specific titles paid through, for example, Patreon. It is primarily payments of specific titles that has increased; here, the number of paying households has more than doubled in one year. This means that household spend on podcasts has almost doubled in one year. The average monthly spend for podcasts across all households now amounts to around SEK 9. Note that this figure does not include payments for services such as Spotify, where podcasts are included.

Today, podcasts are something that attracts a wide audience. Close to 1.5 million 15–74-year-olds in Sweden listen to podcasts on an average day. But most of the podcast that they listen to are “free”, that is, either financed by advertisements or by public service. However, there are many indicators that the paid market will continue to grow, as well as the advertising market. IRM’s forecast for the podcast advertising market is continued, but diminishing, growth in 2023.

Podcasts are still the smallest paid segment within audio, even though it is currently growing the most in terms of paying households. For paid podcasts, two clear “paths” are currently visible: Subscription services with several titles and subscriptions to specific titles. Interest is increasing for both, but specific titles have grown most in terms of the number of paying households, comments Fredrik Liljeqvist, senior analyst at Mediavision.