When you listen to a podcast, you probably don’t have the Netflix app open, at least for now.
If Netflix has its way, that may change. In addition to its recent deal with Spotify, the streamer also signed deals this week with iHeartMedia and Barstool Sports, giving it exclusive video rights to some shows. The company is also rumored to be in talks with SiriusXM.
Podcasters see this as an aggressive move aimed primarily at YouTube. And the data provides a compelling argument. According to YouTube, viewers will listen to more than 700 million hours of podcasts each month on living room devices (like TVs) in 2025, up from 400 million hours per month last year.
“That could pose a long-term competitive threat to Netflix as people start spending less time watching traditional TV and more time watching short-form content and lower cost, lower production value content on YouTube,” Matthew Dysart, an entertainment lawyer and former head of Spotify’s podcast business, told TechCrunch.
Podcasters may understand the motivation, but not everyone is convinced by Netflix’s move. Some podcasters told TechCrunch they’re unsure whether video podcasts have long-term value, while others are concerned that Netflix is contributing to the podcast bubble.
“They’re basically saying, ‘We want to be the king of content, and the only way to do that is by swiping through YouTube,'” podcaster Ronald Young Jr. told TechCrunch. Young Jr. believes that people turn on video podcasts and let them play in the background, noting that ESPN has been doing some version of this for far longer than we can name.
video podcast topics
When independent podcasters Mike Schubert and Sequoia Simone launched their new show, Professional Talkers, this year, they focused on the topic of video podcasting and decided to launch their new show as a video-first production on YouTube and Spotify.
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“Neither of us had ever done video before, so we thought, ‘Why not start from scratch and turn this into a video show?'” Schubert told TechCrunch.
Schubert realized that his audience was ambivalent about video, perhaps because he had spent nearly a decade releasing audio podcasts and had cultivated a fan base that already enjoyed and expected audio content.
“We posted an audio-only episode and the results were pretty similar numerically,” he said. “So why spend so much time and effort on video and risk delaying the episode when you can just have audio?”
Young Jr. considered investing more energy into the video, but decided against it. Like Schubert and Simone, I realized that I was building an audience that preferred listening to podcasts rather than watching them.
“It’s like, ‘So who am I pivoting for?'” he said. “And we realized that at its core, it was for advertisers, podcast executives, and people who thought video was the direction everyone was headed.”
Still, as evidenced by YouTube’s impressive viewership statistics, some consumers still want to watch videos, even if they’re passive shows that turn on in the background.
Podcast producer and host of TWiT.tv, Micah Sargent has been involved with shows such as “This Week in Tech” that have a video component for more than 15 years. (Disclosure: I co-host a show on TWiT.tv once a month.)
“What we hear regularly from our listeners is… ‘When I was going through a tough time or when I had to travel across the country, you were my rock. You were there to listen and you helped me pass the time,'” Sargent told TechCrunch. “There’s a lot of time spent on podcasts. So Netflix can look at that and think, ‘Oh, this is going to take up more time and more streaming than a regular show in some cases.'”
What exactly is a podcast?
There’s a disconnect between how creators and technology companies think about podcasts. For those who create podcasts, podcasts can be conversational shows like YouTube, but they can also be in formats that don’t translate seamlessly to video, such as scripted fiction with sound design and voice actors, or well-reported and polished audio stories like those found on NPR.
“I think this has to do with how nebulous the term podcast is now,” podcaster Eric Silver told TechCrunch. “That means anything. It just means putting on a show right now.”
For these independent creators, the corporate moves happening between Netflix and Spotify won’t immediately impact their daily lives. But podcasters remember what happened when Spotify bought and consolidated large parts of the industry, creating a bubble, and then bursting that same bubble itself. The fallout was felt across the industry, with studio closures, layoffs, and a widespread perception on the sidelines that podcasting was “over.” So when another big tech company dances into their industry, they become skeptical.
“When companies consolidate in any form of entertainment or media, the people who currently have power continue to get richer and wealthier than the industries that are underneath them,” Silver said. “The future becomes increasingly uncertain and resources become increasingly scarce.”
Netflix hasn’t made as extreme a move as Spotify. The latter company spent billions of dollars acquiring several technology startups and studios, giving Spotify control over the entire podcast production process, from recording software to ad sales tools.
“I think what Netflix is doing is a little more calculated than what Spotify is doing,” Young Jr. said. “Spotify was kind of blindly throwing money at top creators, and they kind of tanked the market by doing that. Because the moment you valued Joe Rogan at $250 million… you valued them so highly that you were like, where are regular podcasters going to settle on this?”
But what’s being seen as an industry-changing injection of cash into the podcast industry isn’t actually all that surprising for a company like Netflix, which is set to make about $45 billion this year.
“Netflix and Spotify are similar in that way: aggressive moves to test new value propositions by targeting top performers and spending money that ultimately doesn’t matter that much from a global technology platform perspective, but that makes sense for the creator economy to quickly find out if there’s ‘there’ there,” Dysart said.
Netflix has previously only struck deals with media companies, rather than individual creators like Spotify, but Dysart believes Netflix’s investment is just getting started.
“I predict that at some point Netflix will try to sign a nine-figure deal with a top podcast creator,” he added. “We also expect Netflix to make a really big change by using some really high-profile names on original podcasts.”
Once Netflix becomes popular, our culture will shift from watching daytime programming and talk shows to listening to podcasts.
“My mom used to play soap operas in the background while she was doing something, and I was definitely the type of person who would play ‘The Office’ in the background while I was doing something,” Sargent said. “Now people can play podcasts in the background while they’re doing something. If Netflix becomes a place where they can do that, I think that’s a win for the company.”
