As podcast service Blubrry says there are now over 700,000 podcasts, with 2,000 to 3,000 launching every month, a look at whether we have reached “peak podcast”
that had no thought put into its content and was recorded on an iPhone—failed, therefore the whole medium is on the decline.” https://www.nytimes.com/... Ric Sanchez / @ricsanchez : “People assume that's all a podcast is: two people talking unedited for two hours, three hours.” please kill me! https://www.nytimes.com/... Max Temkin / @maxtemkin : reading this is like gazing at cthulu https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/... Erin / @erinruberry : Thanks to the New York Times for including the most important information in the caption (via https://www.nytimes.com/...) https://twitter.com/... Tobin Low / @tobinlow : (1/2) This article is close to saying something meaningful (that coverage of podcasting has perpetuated the lie that “anyone can do it if they just have a microphone"), but then it draws a...truly bonkers conclusion https://www.nytimes.com/... Rose Eveleth / @roseveleth : “The same D.I.Y. spirit that made having a podcast “alluring” is precisely what doomed the project.” Once more for people in the back: podcasting is hard! You're not just going to make buckets of money by talking into a mic! I hate these kinds of stories!! https://www.nytimes.com/... Dana Stevens / @thehighsign : Ah yes, “podfade,” that term of art we use all the time in #thetrade. & now back to swingin' on the flippity-flop. https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/... Sopan Deb / @sopandeb : wait are we nearing the podcast bubble bursting https://www.nytimes.com/... See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
A year after industry tracking showed podcasting moving past its gold rush stage with audiences and ad budgets still growing, the New York Times runs the counter-framing: Blubrry's count of more than 700,000 shows, with 2,000–3,000 launching every month, raises the question of 'peak podcast.' The piece leans on failed amateur shows recorded on iPhones as evidence of decline.
The pushback is immediate and pointed: podcasters including Max Temkin, Ric Sanchez, and Erin Ruberry take to Twitter to call the conclusions misleading, arguing the Times ignored 'podfade' — the mass of abandoned hobbyist feeds — and judged the whole medium by its lowest-effort output. The fight is really about which number defines the industry: total shows ever published, or shows anyone actually listens to.
First-order effects
- The Times' saturation framing lands on working podcasters first: producers of serious shows now compete against a 'peak podcast' narrative that judges them by unedited iPhone recordings, while Blubrry's launch-rate figures become the default citation for claims the market is oversupplied.
- Advertisers reading the coverage get two conflicting signals at once — record show counts alongside worries about falling ad prices — making the buy-side more selective about which of the 700,000 feeds deserve spend.
Second-order effects
- If buyers internalize the glut narrative, pricing pressure concentrates on mid-tier shows without brand backing, accelerating the split between professionally produced programs and the hobbyist long tail that critics say dominates the raw count.
- Platforms and hosts gain leverage from the same data: with discovery failing under 700,000-plus shows, Apple, Spotify, and hosting services like Blubrry become the gatekeepers whose recommendations and charts decide which launches survive past month one.
Third-order effects
- The pattern points toward a barbell structure — a small professional tier capturing most listening and ad revenue atop an enormous abandoned tail — a dynamic later coverage of the crowded podcast market describes as making almost everything in the business harder.
- Whether 'peak podcast' proves real depends on the metric war this article started: if supply keeps compounding faster than listener attention, the industry's economics will be set by whoever controls discovery and curation rather than by who publishes.
The trend: Podcasting is entering a synthetic-supply phase where the number of shows grows far faster than audience attention, shifting power from creators to the platforms that curate them.