Spotify 🔜 Apple Podcasts HLS, Podcasts Grab Ad-Avoiders, & More

This is the download from Sounds Profitable, your daily source for the essential news in the business of podcasting. I'm Gavin Gaddis. Here's what you need to know for today Thursday, May 14.

First up, expanding our video ecosystem with new partners and supported platforms. Libsyn, Podogy, AudioBoom, Audio Means, and Podspace now support the Spotify distribution API. Creators on those platforms can distribute video podcasts directly to Spotify and monetize eligible content via the partner program. Spotify will also roll out Apple Podcast HLS video support this year, enabling its hosted podcasts to reach Apple's video ecosystem. Next up.

In a nation of ad avoiders, one medium breaks through. UK audiences tend to be ad avoidant in their content. Sound Insights founder Ben Robbins attributes this to the BBC's long history of zero commercial advertising Shaping audiences' baseline content expectations. The 2026 UK Advertising Landscape Study finds 47% of UK adults cannot recall a single brand from advertising they've seen or heard in the past week.

Podcasts are the outlier with 86% of podcast ad recall among 18 to 34 year olds, 3% higher than broadcast TV recall. Podcast ad recall is gender neutral, 79% for men, 80% for women. This mirrors the findings in the US podcast landscape study, suggesting that podcasting's mass appeal across genders is not unique to one country. Next up, Rajar Q1 2026. Analyst Adam Bowie shares the radio joint.

Audience research. I was trying to make sure I got Rajar right that time, and I did. Q1 results for UK media. Radio Reach overall is up 1.3% quarter over quarter and 1.1% year over year, totaling 87% of the UK population listening each week. Podcasts reach twenty-seven percent of the population, consuming at least one podcast a week.

Next up, the Q1 scorecard. Streamonomics takes a look at Q1 streaming profits for the Streaming 8, finding the companies collectively achieved$9.8 billion in profits, a 54% increase from 2025. As of last Friday, the Attention Twenty, the top twenty global attention economy companies ranked by enterprise value were worth twenty trillion dollars, a twenty percent increase since Owl and Company launched the Attention Twenty five weeks ago.

And finally, Japan's largest podcast festival podcast expo twenty twenty six draws twelve thousand seven hundred and thirteen attendees across two days in Tokyo. The inaugural edition of the expo pulled in, as the headline says, twelve thousand seven hundred and thirteen attendees across three public events, a free public market, a paid conference, and an expo area.

The release notes one hundred and fifty two podcast programs were exhibited, sixty-three speakers attended twenty-four sessions, and twenty-two partner companies participated. The Executive Committee overseeing the expo notes Japan's podcast scene has grown rapidly, but there aren't many opportunities for fans and creators to congregate. Podcast Expo twenty twenty six was their first stab at filling that gap.

As for the rest of the news, Alicia Luby, formerly of Right Side Up, BetterHelp and Baritone One, is now director of offline media at Influence Logic. Red Seat Ventures has signed a multi-year partnership with True Crime Podcast Crime Weekly, serving as the show's exclusive audio and video ad sales partner and distributor on both Fox and third party streaming platforms.

Flight Path CEO Sean Howard has a new short video breaking down what Flight Path has learned over four years, teeing up the debut of its revenue optimizer tool next Wednesday on the brand stage in Podcast Show London. De facto sound founder Dallas Taylor chips in on the pivot to video conversation in the world of podcasting, discussing how video growth relates to identity.

The CBC, ABC, and BBC are joining forces to relaunch short form documentary series Shortcuts as a podcast and radio series with original host Josie Long and original production company Falling Tree Productions. Captivate and DaxUS have announced a fully integrated platform partnership aiming to deliver a quote more unified monetization experience for creators, end quote. And finally, Adlarge and the Forward Network have announced a renewal of the Tamson show.

This includes changing things to a upload schedule of Mondays and Thursdays, adding an extra episode per week to meet growing listener and brand partner to me. You can find links to everything I just talked about by clicking the link in your show notes that will take you to today's episode post on soundsprofitable.com, where you can also subscribe to get the newsletter version of the show. Today's episode was written and produced by my Brian Barletta, Tom Webster, and Molly DeMilia.

For sounds profitable, I'm Gavin Gaddis, and I'll see you tomorrow morning for the download recap.