Podcasts are growing in popularity in Australia and over 1.6 million Australians now download audio or video podcasts in an average four weeks, up from under 1 million just four years ago, new research has found.
The Roy Morgan research on Australia’s podcast growth found that although this represents only 8.1 per cent of the Australian population aged 14+, it is nevertheless an increase of nearly 700,000 Australians since 2015 and the market has grown by 70 per cent during this time period.
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Michele Levine, CEO of Roy Morgan, says “Driving the growth in podcasts is the convenience of being able to download the podcast directly to your mobile phone which obviously allows you to listen to the service wherever you want.
“The ability to listen to your favourite podcast while commuting to and from work and tuning out from the hustle and bustle on crowded public transport, or just relaxing in your spare time to catch up on what’s been happening in an area of personal interest is appealing to a growing number of Australians.”
Podcast downloads to mobile phones have more than tripled since 2015 growing to over 1.3 million Australians today. This is an increase of over 900,000 over the last four years, an increase of over 215 per cent.
The research found that growth in podcast downloads to mobile phones has come at the expense of Australians downloading podcasts to computers which peaked in 2016 at just over 570,000 and has since declined significantly to just over 410,000 downloaders in 2019. In addition around 210,000 Australians download podcasts to their tablets in an average four weeks.
“By generation Australia’s most avid podcasters are Millennials who constitute over 40 per cent of podcast downloaders ahead of the younger Gen Z (29 per cent) and slightly older Gen X (21 per cent) while Victorians download at a higher rate than any other state and men are slightly more likely than women,” says Levine.
The findings are taken from Roy Morgan Single Source derived from in-depth face-to-face interviews with 1,000 Australians each week, 50,000 each year.
Levine states “Research conducted directly with real people is qualitatively and quantitatively more valuable than information drawn only through automated processes from web browsers and complicated algorithms. It’s the only way to learn how many real people – not bots, devices, clicks, or impressions – visit a site.”
